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MIRABEAU 




MIRABEAU IN 1 789 

(From a pastel by Boze belonging to M. Henry Mni-cel) 



\_Frontispiece 



FROM THE FRENCH OF 

LOUIS BARTHOU 

PRIME MINISTER OF FRANCE 



ILLUSTRATED 



NEW YORK 
DODD MEAD & COMPANY 









Printed in England 

'/ 



CON'TENrs 

CHAP. P*<^= 

I THE FAMILY OF MIRABEAU 3 

II EARLY YEARS 27 
III FROM THE ChAtEAU d'iF TO THE CHATEAU DE 

joux 48 

IV MIRABEAU AND SOPHIE DE MONNIER 53 

V MIRABEAU AT VINCENNES 7^ 

VI THE LAWSUITS AT PONTARLIER AND AT AIX 89 

VII MADAME DE NEHRA I08 

VIII MIRABEAU IN GERMANY I18 

IX THE APPROACH OF THE REVOLUTION 1 26 

X THE ELECTIONS IN PROVENCE 1 52 

XI MIRABEAU AT THE STATES-GENERAL 161 

XII FROM THE OPENING OF THE STATES-GENERAL 

TO THE EVENTS OF OCTOBER 1 789 1 76 

XIII FROM THE EVENTS OF OCTOBER 1 789 TO THE 

TREATY WITH THE COURT 2o6 

XIV RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 230 
XV THE LAST THREE MONTHS 292 

XVI MIRABEAU AS A STATESMAN 3°9 

XVII MIRABEAU AS AN ORATOR 320 
INDEX 339 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 

To face page 

MIRABEAU IN 1 789 Frontispiece 

{Fro?n a pastel by Boze belonging to M. Henry Marcel) 

THE CHATEAU AND VILLAGE OF MIRABEAU IN 

PROVENCE 10 / 

{From a photograph supplied by M. Maurice Barnes) 

THE COMTESSE DE MIRABEAU 38 ^ 

(From a pastel belonging to M. de Montvalon) 

MADAME DE NEHRA IIO / 

{From a miniature belonging to M. Gabriel Lucas de Montigny) 

THE MARQUIS DE MIRABEAU I46 

{From a draivi->ig ifi the Paul Arbaud Collection at Aix) 

FACSIMILE OF MIRABEAU'S HANDWRITING 222 

{Draft of a letter to his father frojn the original in the collection 
of M. Gabriel Lucas de Montigny) 

MIRABEAU IN 1 79 1 284 

{From a miniature by J. Lemoine belonging to M. F. Flameng) 

DEATH MASK OF MIRABEAU 316 

{Frotn a contemporary drawing in the Paul A rbaud Collection at 
Aix) 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 



To /ace page 

MIRABEAU IN 1 789 Frontispiece 

{From a pastel by Boze belonging to M. Hefny Marcel) 

THE CHATEAU AND VILLAGE OF MIRABEAU IN 

PROVENCE 10 '' 

{From a photograph supplied by M. Maurice Barres) 

THE COMTESSE DE MIRABEAU 38 '' 

{From a pastel belonging to M. de Montvalon) 

MADAME DE NEHRA IIO 

{From a miniature belonging to M. Gabriel Lucas de Montigny) 

THE MARQUIS DE MIRABEAU 146 

{From a drawijtg in the Paul Arbaud Collection at Aix) 

FACSIMILE OF MIRABEAU'S HANDWRITING 222 

{Draft of a letter to his father from the original in the collection 
of M. Gabriel Lucas de Montigny) 

MIRABEAU IN 1 79 1 284 

{From a miniature by J. Lemoine belonging to M. F. Flameng) 

DEATH MASK OF MIRABEAU 316 

{From a contemporary drawing in the Paul A rbaud Collection at 
Aix) 



ORIGINS 



CHAPTER I 

THE FAMILY OF MIRABEAU 

His ancestors — Jean-Antoine — Count Alexander — The Bailli — The Atni 
des Hommes, his life and writings — Family traits — The female line. 

Renan has said that during the Revolution the terrible 
gravity of events made ordinary men into men of genius 
for three months or a year. True as this remark may be 
in many cases, it is not applicable to Mirabeau. The 
Revolution found splendid employment for the exceptional 
gifts of the famous tribune ; but had there been no Revolu- 
tion he would still have been recognized as a great man. 
He came of a race of immemorial antiquity, whose qualities 
and whose defects alike culminated in him. He cannot 
be separated from his ancestry, and we cannot hope to 
understand him without at least some summary know- 
ledge of the sources from which he sprang. 

His father, the Marquis Victor Riqueti de Mirabeau, 
the author of the AtyiI des Hommes, from which he was 
nicknamed, claimed connection with a Ghibelline family, 
the Arrighetti, who were driven out of Florence in 1267 
and 1268. Partial genealogists have more than once used 
the ever ready resources of their profession to create a 
foundation for this claim, but a strict examination of the 
documents makes it more than doubtful, and in all prob- 
ability the question will never be settled. 

On the other hand there is authentic evidence that one 
Pierre Riqueti was "created and elected" consul of 
Seyne, now the capital of a canton in the arrondissement 
of Digne, on January 26, 1346. This origin is less ancient 

3 



MIRABEAU 

and less brilliant than that on which the Marquis de 
Mirabeau used to pride himself, but if it lacks other merits 
it has at least that of certainty. 

The Riqueti family settled at Marseilles at the begin- 
ning of the sixteenth century, and there engaged in the 
coral trade and established a manufactory of scarlet cloth. 
In 1562 Jean Riqueti was elected first consul of Marseilles. 
"It was there," says the Marquis, this time with truth, 
"that our family was really illustrious, for its distinction 
was founded on public utility." It appears, indeed, that 
Jean Riqueti acquired both a great reputation and a great 
fortune. He married Marguerite de Glandeves, who be- 
longed to the old Proven9al nobility, and in 1570 he 
bought the lands and the castle of Mirabeau, situated on 
the Durance. On September 27, 1620, his grandson, 
Thomas, made an even more brilliant marriage with "the 
lady Anne de Pont^ves, legitimate and natural daughter 
of the late illustrious Seigneur Messire Pompee de 
Ponteves, some time Seigneur de Buoulx, captain of fifty 
men-at-arms." In 1660 he received the young Louis XV 
at his house, and Letters Patent of the month of July 
1685 raised the lands of Mirabeau to the dignity of a 
Marquisate. 

The son of Thomas, Honor6 III, soldier, scholar and 
administrator, played an important part at Aix as first 
procurator of the Marseilles district, which as delegate he 
represented at Court. He died in 1687, and it was in his 
son Jean-Antoine that the family of Riqueti de Mirabeau 
produced its first characteristic type. Mirabeau describes 
this Jean-Antoine, his grandfather, as "impressing every 
one by his reputation, his services, his haughty and noble 
bearing, his rapid eloquence, his proud humour, his 
qualities, his virtues and even his defects." 

Jean-Antoine was born on September 29, 1666, and 
passed his childhood at the Chateau of Mirabeau, where 
he was privately educated. He was tall, well built and 

4 



THE FAMILY OF MIRABEAU 

handsome, generous and brave, and before he was eighteen 
he was placed in the Corps of Musketeers, in which he 
remained four years. His gallantry and his great love for 
his profession led him constantly to the wars. In 1696 
he had the command of an infantry regiment, which he 
kept admirably in hand by his activity, firmness and even- 
handed justice. He was more affable to the humble than 
conciliatory with the great, and was a man of independent 
character and ready repartee. Humorous and also terrible 
sayings of his are quoted, which (as he was no courtier) 
did not advance his fortunes. The Due de Vendome, 
displeased with some exceedingly sharp answer which he 
seems to have made to Louis XIV, said to him, "Hence- 
forth I shall present you to the enemy, but never again 
to the King." 

Against the enemy at Chiari, at Luzzara, at Mantua he 
was always first in the field, exposing his great frame to 
every danger, and much less careful of his own life than 
of those of his men. In 1705 at Cassano he disputed, 
pistol in hand, with one of his friends the honour of 
defending a bridge whose strategic importance was deci- 
sive against the advance of Prince Eugene. A bullet 
having broken his right arm he tried to use an axe with 
his left, but a musket-ball cut the sinews of his neck and 
also the jugular vein. He fell and was left for dead, his 
body serving as a stepping-stone for the enemy. When 
he spoke of Cassano in after years he used to say, "That 
was the affair in which I was killed." He survived indeed, 
but by no means unscathed, for he never recovered the 
use of his right arm, and as the result of an operation, 
the boldness of which astonished the people of those days, 
he had to wear a silver collar to support his head. 

His military career was thus interrupted when he was 
forty. Inaction was burdensome, and he married. Neither 
his character, which was impetuous and violent, nor his 
infirmities seemed to indicate the choice of a young wife. 

5 



MIRABEAU 

Yet it was a young, noble and beautiful lady that he 
married. While taking the waters at Digne, where he was 
nursing his wounds in 1706, he met Mile, de Castellane, 
whose physical attractions no less than her goodness and 
dignity made a deep impression on him. He tried, in a 
strange fashion, to secure her hand without her parents' 
knowledge. This odd proceeding, which was intended to 
hasten matters, delayed the marriage, which did not take 
place until two years later, when Mile, de Castellane was 
twenty-three. She knew how to give way to the humours 
of a husband whose character had been exacerbated by 
suffering. "Ah, madame ! " she said one day to a friend 
who had presumed to pity her, "if you only knew what a 
happiness it is to be able to respect one's husband " ; and 
she forgot neither the respect she owed to him nor that 
which she owed to herself. 

The regiment having been sold, Jean-Antoine retired to 
his castle of Mirabeau, where, with his wife's assistance 
and not without violence, he tried to put his estates in 
order. His brother-in-law failed in the execution of an 
order, and the system he established cost him a hundred 
thousand crowns. This loss, which reduced the family 
from embarrassment to poverty, was bravely borne. They 
retired to Aix, and after a time entirely redeemed their 
fortunes by order and economy. Jean-Antoine died on 
May 27, 1737, in his seventy-first year, honoured and 
regretted even by those who had suffered under his 
masterful temper. His wife survived until 1769. 

There were seven children of the marriage of Jean- 
Antoine Riqueti and Frangoise de Castellane. Four of 
these died before their father: three sons survived him. 
Their education had been very severe. They had never 
dared to "worship their father to his face," nor had they 
ever any prolonged conversation with him. They were 
so afraid of him that his letters, which he used to dictate 
to his wife, made their hearts beat faster. "I never had 

6 



THE FAMILY OF MIRABEx-lU 

the honour," wrote his eldest son, "of touching the flesh 
of this venerable man, who was essentially a good father, 
but whose dignity restrained the goodness which was 
ever present but never visible." It may not be too much 
to say that this was a particular case of a general scheme 
of education. The severity which kept at a distance the 
expressions of filial tenderness proceeded from Jean- 
Antoine's exceptional temperament. His sons were not 
so well armed against the vicissitudes of life. 

All three had been made Knights of Malta while still 
boys. The youngest, Alexandre-Louis, had the shortest, 
but not the least romantic career. His "impetuous eccen- 
tricities," as his brother called them, though characteristic 
of the family, were not such as could be recalled with 
pleasure. After serving under Vauvenargues he was pro- 
moted to the rank of captain in the King's regiment, and 
was present at the battles of Dettingen, Fontenoy, Lawfeld 
and Raucoux, and at the sieges of Namur, Ypres and 
Furnes. Like his father he was a gallant soldier. But 
the " lively passions " which Vauvenargues had detected 
in him hurried him into an intrigue with a certain Mile. 
Navarre, mistress of Marshal Saxe (among others), and 
in 1747, at the age of twenty-three, he married her. This 
union scandalized his family, but did not last long. He 
lost his wife in 1749, but was not reconciled with his rela- 
tives, who could not forgive his having married beneath 
him. ( In 1755, however, he gained the favour of the 
Margravine of Bayreuth, sister of Frederick the Great, 
who happened to be passing through Avignon, and who 
made him her Grand Chamberlain and Privy Councillor. 
First the King of Prussia and then the Margravine sent 
him on missions to the Court of France. This unexpected 
greatness conciliated his brothers, but nothing could 
satisfy his mother short of a second marriage which would 
enable her to forget the first. He accordingly took as his 
second wife the Countess von Kunsberg, on whom the 

7 



MIRABEAU 

Margravine conferred a dowry as a reward for his services. 
This alHance repaired his credit, but brought him only a 
few months of happiness, for he died in July 1761, less 
than a year after the wedding. His wife, "the little 
Countess," went to live with her mother-in-law, by whom 
she was adored, and on whom she lavished a devoted 
affection in the terrible trials which afflicted her old age. 
The Countess died in 1772. 

This uncle of Mirabeau played no part in the life of 
the tribune, unless it were by example, and I have, there- 
fore, passed rapidly over his career, though it is by no 
means without interest. The other son of Jean-Antoine, 
known as "the Bailli," concerns us much more directly. 
He was the second in order of birth, and lived from 1717 
to 1794. In his long career, which was honourable, and 
even glorious, he did not perhaps obtain all the prizes 
which his services deserved, but his only real misfortunes 
were the misfortunes of his family, and of these he had 
more than his share. 

At thirteen years of age he entered the corps attached 
to the King's Galleys, and had a precocious youth. At 
fifteen, according to his own account, he had "already gone 
the devil of a pace," and the phrase must be construed 
in its fullest sense. It would have mattered little if he 
had merely sown his wild oats, but he was fond of brandy, 
and his excesses often landed him in prison. When he 
was eighteen he cured himself of this horrible vice by a 
deliberate effort of his powerful will, and thereafter hardly 
a year of his life passed without a campaign. He was 
twice wounded, and once made prisoner by the English, 
and one by one he rose through all the ranks of the 
service. In 1751 he was a post-captain and the author of 
numerous memoirs. In 1752 he was made governor of 
Guadeloupe, where almost every public department was 
under his control. The gallant sailor was also a wise 
administrator, and he tells us that he was "loved a little, 

8 



THE FAMILY OF MIRABEAU 

esteemed a good deal, and feared even more." It is clear 
that those who feared him most were the rogues, who were 
numerous and rapacious, and who were powerless in 
presence of his uncompromising honesty. Slavery was 
repugnant to his humane sentiments, and ideas of this 
kind, which were hostile to so many interests, some 
of them illicit, made him anything but a favourite 
with the bureaucracy, against which he maintained a 
struggle entirely to the credit of his courage and his 
integrity. 

He returned to France for reasons of health in 1755, 
and resumed active service in the following year, when he 
was wounded at the siege of Mahon. His experience and 
his services justified his ambition, and even his expecta- 
tion, of becoming Minister of Marine. On two occasions, 
in 1757 and 1758, the patronage of Madame de Pompadour 
seemed on the point of realizing his hopes. But the heroic 
admiral was a bad courtier; he had inherited from his 
father a contempt not only for death, but also for intrigue, 
and the Ministry of Marine escaped him. Other employ- 
ment, however, was found for his exceptional qualities. 
From 1758 till 1761, under Marshal de Belle-Isle, he 
was Inspector-General of the Coast-guard of Saintonge, 
Picardy, Normandy and Brittany. During the Seven 
Years' War this post was no sinecure. The Minister of 
War, who had appointed him, found him invaluable. At 
St. Malo, at Saint Cast, at Havre he rendered the greatest 
possible services against the English, for whom he had 
no love, and whom "he was accustomed to regard as the 
enemies of the human race." A letter from his elder 
brother, dated December 16, 1760, in the following terms, 
brought him back to Paris : "My dear brother, I am about 
to be arrested; as it is by order of the King we have 
nothing to say . . ." 

This brother was two years his elder, and he was on 
terms of the closest affection with him. The younger, as 

9 



MIRABEAU 

became a man of spirit and high integrity, performed the 
duties imposed by the laws of primogeniture with loyalty 
and devotion. He regarded his brother as the head of the 
family, to whom he "left the charge of his business affairs." 
Even in matters concerning himself and his own career he 
asked and took his advice. They were usually far from 
each other, and they constantly exchanged long letters 
(more than four thousand are extant), in which they dis- 
cussed all manner of topics. There are few instances of 
correspondence so varied in interest and so vivacious. 
There is a whole world of ideas in the letters which the 
brothers wrote to each other, and in order to understand 
them we must go back a little, and study in the Marquis 
de Mirabeau what would have been the strangest figure in 
the Riqueti family, had not the Marquis himself had a son 
whose glory, whose genius and whose vices surpass and 
efface all that his " unbridled race " had produced before 
him. 



Victor de Riqueti, father of the Tribune, was born on 
October 5, 17 15, in the small town of Pertuis in Provence, 
where his mother had gone (as she went in the case of her 
two subsequent children) for her confinement. At three 
years of age he was made a Knight of Malta. It is not 
clear whether he had his first schooling at Aix or at Mar- 
seilles. But in any case, in accordance with the family 
tradition, his education was not prolonged, for at the age 
of fourteen he entered the army as an ensign. His father, 
in a somewhat brusque leave-taking, advised him to be 
good in order to be happy; but his life, in the course of 
which he was neither the one nor the other, was not in 
harmony with this prudent counsel. After two years with 
his regiment he was sent to the "Academy " at Paris, where 
he became "the head of a band of worthless young men." 
He was regular in his work, but excesses, which he himself 




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describes as "amazing," undermined his health and ex- 
hausted his resources. His father turned a deaf ear to all 
financial appeals, and by the paternal order he joined 
Duras's regiment at Besan^on, with the rank of captain. 
He saw some active service, made some unsuccessful 
appearances at Versailles, contracted some debts, was 
wounded, wearied of a profession in which he was a failure, 
and, in order to quit it with honour, sent in his papers on 
March 7, 1743. 

The labours of authorship suited him better than the 
profession of arms. In 1737, and perhaps even earlier, he 
had taken up political economy, and had written copiously. 
It was about this time that he made the acquaintance of 
Vauvenargues, an officer like himself and a distant relative. 
Vauvenargues soon diagnosed his character. "You, my 
dear Mirabeau," he wrote, "are of an ardent, melancholy 
temper, prouder, more restless, more unstable than the sea, 
with a sovereign insatiability for pleasure, knowledge and 
glory." In this sentence there is a complete portrait, and 
it may not be premature to say that the Marquis's son was 
destined to resemble it very closely. It may be added that 
the Marquis de Mirabeau had as just an idea of Vauven- 
argues as the latter had of him ; so much so that in his 
letters he actually reveals to his friend his true talent, and 
promises him reputation in the "republic of letters," if he 
will only display strength, accuracy and depth of thought. 
He encourages and stimulates the moralist, and reproaches 
him with affectionate insistence for allowing the gifts and 
the genius lavished on him by nature to remain hidden. 
As for himself, devoured, as he confesses he is, by the 
ambition to make his name, to be "somebody," he seeks 
in literature a consolation for the disappointments of his 
military life. He writes verse and prose, he composes 
portraits in the manner of La Bruyere ; he researches and 
collaborates with Le Franc de Pompignan in the Voyage 
de Languedoc et de Provence, written in 1740, and he 

II 



MIRABEAU 

interests himself in agricultural questions because "a 
philosopher ought to end there." 

Meanwhile, while awaiting the hour of this philosophic 
termination, the Marquis de Mirabeau turned his thoughts 
to marriage. At the age of twenty-five he confessed that 
"pleasure had become the executioner of his imagination," 
and that ^'immorality was for him a second nature." This 
confidence, addressed to Vauvenargues, was, it is true, 
accompanied by the hope that women would after a time 
cease to occupy "the smallest corner " in his life. He may 
have thought that in 1743 that time had come. At any 
rate he was a man of agreeable presence, sufficient fortune, 
and a high-sounding name ; he was twenty-eight years of 
age and free from military service, and he made up his 
mind to marry. The net revenue left to him by his father 
may be estimated at 16,000 livres. In 1740 he had bought 
the estate of Le Bignon in the Gatinais, ten leagues from 
Sens, and two years later a "corpse of a house " in the Rue 
Bergere at Paris. 

Being thus provided with a town house and a country 
seat, he looked for a wife, and found one in 1743 in the 
Vassan family. M. de Vassan was the son of a president 
of the Chambre des Comptes of Paris ; he came from the 
Soissonais and had married the daughter of the Marquis 
de Sauveboeuf, who, in addition to property in Perigord 
and in Poitou, had brought him the barony of Pierre- 
Bufifi^re, near Limoges. Of this marriage was born a 
daughter, Marie-Genevieve. In 1743 she was seventeen 
and already a widow, though her first marriage had been 
a marriage only in name. The Marquis de Mirabeau did 
not know this young lady, but he asked for and obtained 
her hand. As it was not, therefore, her personal charms 
which influenced him, one would naturally have supposed 
that it must have been her money, were it not known that 
the marriage contract gave Mile, de Vassan only 4000 
livres of dowry, and also that her mother reserved to 

12 



THE FAMILY OF MIRABEAU 

herself the free disposal of her immense fortune. The 
Marquis was, it would seem, content with expectations. 

The marriage took place at the Chateau d'Aigueperse, 
near Limoges. Its financial advantages were doubtful, 
and were not compensated by the attractions of the lady. 
Mile, de Vassan was neither beautiful nor ugly. She did 
not altogether lack humour, but she had no serious 
interests. Her character was harsh, difficult and irritable. 
She was, in fact, a futile, unstable and petulant person, who 
discharged her household duties without either ability or 
charm. In all she did she was shiftless and unsystematic, 
and there was a certain slovenliness in her manners (not to 
call it by a worse name) which was quite out of harmony with 
her birth and station. With all this she was very exacting, 
and her jealousy was so easily aroused that there were con- 
stant tearful scenes, followed by "consolatory negotiations." 

The Marquis's friends were amazed that he should have 
married a woman whose absurdities could not fail to be an 
obstacle to his career and a hindrance to his legitimate 
ambitions. After his very first interview with her the 
Bailli came to the conclusion that "the girl was not fit to 
be seen anywhere." Her husband, however, continued to 
put up with her. To his wife's turbulent affection he 
opposed a kindof patient resignation which was rather good 
nature than love. Ill-assorted as their union was, it was for 
a time comparatively peaceful, and in eleven years eleven 
children were born to them, of whom only five survived. 

The Marquis divided his time between the management 
of his estates and the study of political economy. In 1747 
he wrote a, Political Testament, which was never printed. 
Its central idea, surrounded as it is by many oddities, 
seems to be the reconstruction of a kind of feudal aristo- 
cracy, rejuvenated and fortified by the development of the 
powers of local authorities and the magisterial privileges 
of the nobility. In 1750 he published, but did not sign, a 
Memoir on the utility of the Provincial States in relation 

13 



MIRABEAU 

to the Royal Authority. The mere title of this piece 
impHes a whole programme, the boldness of which led 
d'Argenson to attribute the anonymous pamphlet to the 
President de Montesquieu. I will only quote one passage 
from this essay, but it is worth remembering. The 
Marquis de Mirabeau reviews the organization of the States 
in the different provinces, and pauses at the States of 
Languedoc, the law and constitution of which he prefers 
above the rest. There the three orders met every three 
years and sat together. The representatives of the tiers 
etat, however, in numbers equalled those of the two others 
put together, and votes went by counting heads. The 
Marquis thinks that this arrangement is only fair to the 
tiers etat, "for it is they who support the greater part of 
the burden." Forty years later this assertion found a 
startling echo in the passionate eloquence of his son at the 
Jeu de Paume. 

The publication, in 1756, of L'Ami des Hommes, a 
Treatise on Population, brought the Marquis both fame 
and popularity. The book excited real enthusiasm in its 
day, and, though it is now no longer read, it would be 
unjust not to recognize the originality of some of its ideas. 
It was the Marquis de Mirabeau who first proposed the 
creation of a Ministry of Agriculture. He pronounces in 
favour of Free Trade. He thinks that wealth is unfairly 
divided, and, using a formula picturesque in its audacity, 
he goes so far as to write that "great fortunes in a State 
are like pike in a fishpond." Our author, active and enter- 
prising, even adventurous, has no love for unearned incre- 
ment. He denounces rentiers as "eating the bread of idle- 
ness," and attributes to this class almost all the ills which 
afBiict society. Among his paradoxes and his outbursts, 
his obscurities and his hesitations, he hits on profound 
truths and real anticipations of the future. At a later date, 
when he had come to know Quesnay, he said that he had 
stated the problem of population wrongly, and apologized 

14 



THE FAMILY OF MIRABEAU 

for "putting the cart before the horse." None the less he 
was right when he advocated the foundation of a large 
number of institutions in which unmarried mothers might 
place their children and have them brought up, and also 
when he went further and claimed that if such a mother is 
in poor circumstances "she should receive on leaving the 
hospital the sum of ten crowns for the present which she 
has made to the State." He anticipates Emile in arguing 
strongly for mothers nursing their own children. "If I 
were master," he wrote, "I should augment by law the 
dower of every mother who had herself given suck to her 
children." The desertion of the countryside strikes him 
as a social evil. "We are leaving the hamlets for the 
villages, the villages for the towns, the towns for the 
capital. This is what happens to every nation unless 
the government takes care to give it an impulse in the 
contrary direction." He hates war and slavery; he 
preaches the fraternity of nations. True, he is too much 
of an aristocrat, too proud of his race and too much 
attached to his rights to conclude in favour of the equality 
of all citizens; but we must give him credit for "giving 
place with silent respect to a water-carrier because the poor 
man carries a burden, and enduring the contact of a beggar 
whose evil odour and ragged garments reproach me with 
a misconception of fraternity." Thirty years later his son, 
engaged in a fierce polemic against a powerful company, 
was to become in fact the champion of the water-carrier. 

The following phrase is often quoted from the Ami des 
Hommes because it has been regarded as a prophecy of the 
Revolution : "Those who do not see the danger are very 
blind : it is close upon us." I do not underrate the gravity 
of such a warning, but it would be wrong to exaggerate the 
importance which the author intended to give to it. The 
chief defect of the Ami des HoTrmies, and, I believe, the 
chief reason for the neglect which has overtaken it, is in- 
deed the absence of any doctrine which is at once precise, 

15 



MIRABEAU 

logical and complete. The book is well filled and luxuri- 
ant; it contains many views but no system. The system 
did not come till later, and then it was borrowed from 
Dr. Quesnay, physician to Mme. de Pompadour, who 
imposed his principles on the Marquis de Mirabeau. 

Quesnay had just published in the Encyclopedie two 
articles on "Farmers" and "Grain," certain new agricul- 
tural ideas which were in harmony with those of the 
Ami des Hommes. Dr. Quesnay, a frank, free-thinking, 
obstinate, independent and industrious person, was sixty- 
two and a skilful surgeon. He occupied a set of apart- 
ments above those of Mme. de Pompadour, who was 
amused by the gaiety and originality of her doctor, and 
often went to see him. If we may believe Marmontel's 
Memoirs, she used frequently to meet there d'Alembert, 
Diderot, Turgot, Helvetius and Buff on. With such 
visitors, it may easily be imagined what an intellectual 
laboratory Dr. Quesnay's apartments became. They 
talked of many things at these gatherings : it would be 
more correct to say that they talked of everything; and the 
doctor was not inferior in powers of thought to any of his 
distinguished friends. He had a doctrine, and even a 
system, in which everything had its place. He was 
country bred, and had a strong taste for country questions. 
According to him, all things useful to mankind are 
products of the earth. Industry may transform them and 
commerce may transport them, but agricultural labour 
alone can directly create riches. The earth by its natural 
fertility gives to the cultivator a surplus exceeding the 
worth of their labour and expenditure which constitutes 
a "net product." This "net product" was the basis of all 
Quesnay's teaching. From it followed consequences of 
the greatest importance in fiscal, economic and social 
science. In order to explain these and to convince him 
of their truth, Quesnay invited the Marquis de Mirabeau to 
come and see him. 

i6 



THE FAMILY OF MIRABEAU 

The first interview irritated the Ami des Hommes; the 
second was sufficient to convince and conquer him. "The 
principles of my science," he wrote in later days to Jean 
Jacques Rousseau, "are not my own. I was over forty 
when I adopted them, and before I did so I had, at the 
cost of my self-esteem, to disavow the work to which I 
owe my celebrity and my public reputation. I had to bow 
my head under the crooked talons of a man who, of all 
others, was antipathetic to my own beloved natural exuber- 
ance, who was a most bitter controversialist and a most 
implacable opponent, and who was armed with the most 
cutting and scornful satire." The tone of this confession 
in itself shows how complete the conquest effected by "the 
monkey " Quesnay must have been. Before he met the 
doctor the author of the Ami des Hommes may have 
thought himself a master, afterwards he resigned himself 
to being merely a pupil. 

It was under the influence of the "tenacious doctor" 
that the Marquis de Mirabeau published his Theory of 
Taxation, which appeared in December 1760. He knew 
well how daring the book was, and he suspected that he 
ran some personal risk. "It will be a miracle," he said, 
"if it all passes off as quietly as heretofore." There was 
reason for his uneasiness. The opening sentence struck 
the dominant note of the book : it was a terrible reproach. 
"Sir, you have twenty millions of men, more or less, who 
are your subjects. These men all have some money : 
almost all are capable of the kind of service your Majesty 
requires of them. And yet it is found impossible to obtain 
service without money or to obtain money to pay for 
service. This means, in plain language, that your people 
are unconsciously withdrawing themselves from you. The 
will of the people indeed is still attached to your Majesty's 
person, which they distinguish from the agents of your 
authority, though they do not dare to say so in this craven 
age. Your power is nothing but the union of the will of a 
c 17 



MIRABEAU 

strong and active multitude with your will : a disjunction 
of these wills would cut at the root of your power. That 
is the evil and the source thereof." 

When a man addresses his king in such terms it is 
difficult to be less audacious towards the agents of the 
Royal power. The Marquis de Mirabeau did not spare 
them. His attacks on abuses roused more rancour than his 
teaching, though his teaching was bold enough. Taxation 
according to him was only a tribute voluntarily granted 
by the king's subjects, adjusted and collected by the 
provincial states which, according to him, should be 
established everywhere for that purpose. It was, how- 
ever, his proposal to abolish the contract system which 
struck the deadliest blow at the farmers-general, whose 
activities he denounced as inimical to the national life. 
Their retort was not long in coming. On December i6, 
the Marquis de Mirabeau was arrested and committed to 
the Chateau of Vincennes. The rejoicings of his enemies 
were short lived. His friends were deeply moved, and 
agitated in his favour : the King yielded. On December 
24, the Marquis left his prison, but was ordered to betake 
himself to his estate of Le Bignon. 

This was exile, but in spite of the winter weather he did 
not at first complain much of his fate. Mme. de Mirabeau 
accompanied him, but she was not his consolation. With 
his wife went a lady of their acquaintance, "one of those 
women who do their sex the greatest honour, alike by the 
extent and solidity of their attainments and the goodness 
of their hearts." When the Marquis described his fair 
friend in these terms to Mme. de Rochefort he did not add 
that she was thirty years of age, good-looking, witty and 
fascinating. Her name was Mme. de Pailly; she was the 
wife of an elderly Swiss officer of Lausanne, from whom 
she usually lived apart. The Marquis had known her for 
some years, and she was congenial to Mme. de Mirabeau, 
of whom so far she does not appear to have been a rival. 

18 



THE FAMILY OF MIRABEAU 

The time, however, was at hand when Mme. de Pailly was 
to take openly in M. de Mirabeau's life the place which 
she retained until his death, and which had been abandoned 
or inadequately filled by his lawful wife. 

For two years things had been amiss between the 
spouses, who had ceased even to keep up appearances. 
In July 1758, the Marquis was already railing against 
his wife, who complained (rather vaguely) that she was 
denied her conjugal rights, and who demanded that a 
certain servant should be dismissed. As the Marquise 
disliked his house so much, he declared in favour of "a 
settlement without a scandal," the basis of which was to 
be that her property should be returned, and that she 
should go back to her mother on condition that she should 
"make some contribution to the maintenance and educa- 
tion of her children." It was to be an amicable separation. 
The Marquis, whose patience was at an end, adapted 
himself without difficulty to the new situation. "Cato," 
he said, "sent away his wife, and when his friends came 
with their ' ifs ' and ' buts ' he pointed to his shoe. ' It is 
well made,' said he, ' but it pinches, and none of you can 
know where.' I shall not send away my wife, but if she 
dismisses me I shall accept that as final, depend upon it." 
Since his exile at Le Bignon, where the Marquise had 
joined him, it does not appear that anything remarkable 
had happened. Two years later, in 1762, Mme. de Vassan 
fell ill and her daughter went to stay with her in the 
Limousin. She summoned her husband, "who, whatever 
may happen, will be dear to her till her dying day." The 
Marquis went without haste, but failed to induce either 
the mother or the daughter to accept the proposals of 
separation which he submitted. It was at this moment that 
certain documents came into his possession which showed 
beyond all doubt that the Marquise had been guilty of 
misconduct. This was "a dunghill which a decent man 
could not be expected to cover with his mantle." The 

19 



MIRABEAU 

wretched woman had not only had a lover ; with a refine- 
ment of vice due, it must be supposed, to a special degree 
of infatuation, she had handed that lover a certificate of 
her guilt. Thus armed against his wife the Marquis 
ordered her to remain in Limousin. She defended 
herself feebly, so feebly that her denials amounted almost 
to a confession. She undertook never to return to Paris, 
on condition that the Marquis made her an allowance of two 
thousand crowns net, payable quarterly to agents nomin- 
ated by her. A month later, on March 3, 1763, the 
Marquis agreed toi this plan, which well suited his own 
views, and in conversation with Mme. de Vassan he even 
agreed to increase his wife's allowance to 10,000 crowns in 
the event of his mother-in-law's death. Thus in August 
1763 the separation of the couple was completely and 
amicably settled. 

I have hitherto said nothing of the children of this 
strange household. There were five, the eldest of whom 
was a girl of eighteen. It is tO' her that her mother alludes 
in one of her letters when she says, " I have a positive 
duty to perform. I wish to see my daughter before sihe 
becomes a nun. I ought to see her, I wish to test her 
vocation, by my words, my fears, and my arguments. An 
irrevocable decision of this kind cannot be too carefully 
scrutinized." Nothing came of the maternal wishes : the 
daughter took the veil at the convent of the Dominican 
Sisters of Montargis on March 13, 1763; she was subject 
to attacks of insanity. There were two other girls, aged 
respectively sixteen and eleven. The former married the 
Marquis du Saillant, in November 1763, the latter at the 
age of seventeen became the wife of the Marquis de Cabris 
in 1769. 

There were two boys, the elder of whom, Honore- 
Gabriel, was fourteen at the time of his parents' separation. 
The other, Andr6-Boniface-Louis, was nine, and was the 
youngest of the whole family. 

20 



THE FAMILY OF MIRABEAU 

In a letter of April i, 1762, the Marquise de Mirabeau 
writes from the Limousin about "something very advanta- 
geous for one of my daughters which must not be missed." 
On February 3, 1763, she said, "They wish to separate 
me from my children, they do not wish them to become 
fond of me — I hope that they are sufficiently well bred not 
to neglect me, and I do not wish to owe them anything 
which their goodness of heart is not willing to grant." 

When she spoke like this, neither she nor her husband 
was under any illusion. She had never been able to do 
anything to gain or preserve her children's affection. She 
had been an idle and a frivolous mother, entirely under 
her husband's domination, and had taken no part in their 
education. She had delegated the duty of bringing up 
her daughters to the convent of Montargis, from which 
they passed without transition into married life. Her 
direct concern with the upbringing of her sons was of 
course even less. The influence she did exert upon them 
was that of her temperament, and this was unfortunately 
undeniable and should be borne in mind by any one who 
wishes to understand some of the less praiseworthy of the 
actions of the most famous of the two. 

More than any great man, Mirabeau owed his qualities 
and his defects, his virtues and his vices to the stock from 
which he sprang. His life and his genius, his prodigious 
greatness and his lamentable weaknesses, everything in 
his eventful career will remain an irritating enigma to all 
those who do not connect him with the line of his ances- 
tors. Apart from them, and without them, nothing is 
comprehensible. With them and through them every- 
thing, or nearly everything, is clear. I will, therefore, 
summarize the leading family characteristics. 

In the first place there was an exceptional aptitude for 
the military profession ; the Riquetis de Mirabeau were a 
race of soldiers. Without going further back than the 
first years of the seventeenth century we find Thomas, son 

21 



MIRABEAU 

of Honor6 II, making for himself a brilliant reputation in 
the Italian wars. Of his six sons the four youngest were 
made Knights of Malta before they came of age ; all were 
fighters more or less. Honore III, before he gained by 
his civic virtues the surname of the Solomon of his country, 
had borne arms in Italy, in Catalonia, at Lerida. It was 
the same with his brothers, one of whom after being a 
captain in the French Galleys became inspector, another 
a post-captain, took part in the war against Spain, while 
a third held letters of marque against the Turks. Bruno, 
who survived them, served in the Guards, was present at 
thirty sieges and received seventeen wounds. Jean- 
Antoine, whose heroic gallantry I have described, was their 
nephew, and I have referred to the military services of the 
Marquis de Mirabeau on land and of his brother the Bailli 
on the sea. 

All the Mirabeaus had wit and verve, ready tongues and 
a taste for adventure. They were sensitive, by no means 
long suffering, ready with a word or a blow. Their 
courage was often foolhardy, their tempers often violent, 
and some of them had so little self-mastery that they might 
almost be called insane. Of Bruno, who was one of this 
type, the Marquis de Mirabeau observed, "it is all very well 
to be a little mad, but he is three-quarters out of his mind." 
He was not altogether a lunatic, however, for the Marechal 
de Vauban was his friend, and when some expressed 
astonishment he observed, "this lunatic has qualities not 
to be found among the sane." The same remark applies 
to other members of the family, as will be seen. 

Finally this "tempestuous race" (as the Marquis de 
Mirabeau called it) was, especially in its last generation, 
above all things amorous, the sport and victim of strong 
passions. We have seen that the Bailli himself had spent 
his youth in terrible excesses. He was able to reform, but 
others of his own generation and later did not try to do so. 

As to their wives, the family boasted that among their 

22 



THE FAMILY OF MIRABEAU 

ancestresses was Sibylle de Fos, of the House of the Counts 
of Provence, celebrated by the troubadours for her grace 
and her talents, but they produced no proof of this. The 
ladies who are known, the Gland^ves, the Pont^ves, the 
Rochemores were of good blood, women of sound intelli- 
gence and pious character. Anne de Pont^ves, anticipated 
at the holy water font by another woman, gave her a box on 
the ear, saying, "Here, as in the army, the baggage comes 
behind." Mme. de S^vigne appreciated Elisabeth de 
Rochemore. As regards their morals there is nothing to 
show that these were defective, but I should not suppress 
the fact that the wife of Jean-Antoine, that is to say the 
grandmother of Mirabeau, after an irreproachable life 
sank in her eightieth year into a horrible form of dementia, 
characterized by outbursts of violently obscene talk. As 
for Mirabeau's mother, I have said enough to show that 
her aberrations had not the excuse of old age, and that they 
were not limited to her conversation. 

Such, in broad outline, is the lineage of the man who 
was on occasion to fall so low and to tise so high. We 
now come to Mirabeau himself, and it is our task to give a 
complete picture of him in all his terrifying and seductive 
complexity. 



23 



BEFORE THE REVOLUTION 



CHAPTER II 

EARLY YEARS 

Childhood and education of Mirabeau— In the Army— At Aix, Le Bignon 
and Paris— His marriage with Mile, de Marignane — His debts — His 
adventure at Grasse. 

Gabriel-Honore Riqueti de Mirabeau was born at Le 
Bignon on March 9, 1749, having already two teeth. He 
was a large, fat, child of unusual strength. At three years 
of age he used to fight and struggle with his nurse. At 
this time he had an attack of small-pox, and was the 
victim of an imprudent course of treatment applied by his 
mother, the result of which was that his face remained 
seamed and scarred till the end of his days. This ugliness, 
in painful contrast with the normal beauty of his race, 
displeased and irritated his father and became the initial 
cause of his severity towards his son. The boy's education 
was entrusted to one Poisson, a learned and intelligent 
person who afterwards became the Marquis's land-agent. 
Poisson carefully cultivated his pupil's intelligence, but 
took too much pains to curb his terrible exuberance. 
Gabriel was a great reader and an indefatigable questioner, 
and by the time he was five his knowledge was remarkable. 
But he was also very pert and troublesome, ill-disciplined, 
talkative, and vivacious in a way that revealed a surprising 
precocity. He was always being punished. "I might 
say," he wrote in after years to his father, "that since my 
earliest childhood, and my first steps in the world, I have 
received few proofs of your kindness, that you treated me 
harshly before I could possibly have deserved it. And yet 
you should have seen at a very early stage that this method 

27 



MIRABEAU 

excited my temper instead of repressing it, that it was as 
easy to soften as to irritate me, and that the first course was 
for my good while the second was not." 

In spite of this it was no other than the Ami des Hommes 
himself who had proclaimed the principle that "in every 
case without exception, coercive measures are those best 
fitted to produce on a man the effect the most contrary to 
their object." He was visibly disconcerted by his son. 
He thought him "fantastic, headstrong, and difficult to 
get on with, ill-inclined, an untidy braggart, an amazing 
compound of badness and commonness." At the same 
time he could not but see in him "sense and talent, a bold 
heart under his pinafore, an intelligence, a power of 
memory and a vivacity which are startling, surprising, 
positively alarming." Sometimes the child "promises to 
do very well," sometimes "he will never be more than the 
quarter of a man, if indeed he is anything at all." Were 
these judgments really as contradictory as they sound and 
are they to be attributed to the capriciousness and irrita- 
bility of the Marquis's temper? On the whole I do not 
think so. When Mirabeau reached man's estate there was 
in him the same contrast of qualities and defects that his 
father saw in him when he was a child. The pitiless 
rigidity and narrowness of the education inflicted on 
Gabriel condemned him to alternations of hypocrisy 
and rebellion. His son's growing ugliness more and more 
irritated the Marquis, who was less inclined to praise in 
him the family virtues than to detect "the vile qualities of 
his mother's family." This attitude of mind was not likely 
to make for kindness. 

At the age of fifteen, the boy, who was outgrowing 
Poisson, was entrusted to a friend of the family, the 
"honest and romantic" Sigrais, an old officer whom he 
immediately conquered by his wit, his memory, and his 
good heart. This experiment, which his father considered 
too gentle, was given up after a few months. Gabriel, 

28 



EARLY YEARS 

now styled Pierre-Buffiere from his mother's estate in 
Limousin, entered a mihtary estabHshment in Paris kept 
by the Abbe Choquard in May 1764. Some indiscretion 
which he committed there induced the Marquis to send 
him to a house of correction, from which he was dehvered 
by a deputation of his comrades armed with a " large paper 
of petitions signed by them all." Already he was exercising 
that power of irresistible fascination which, during the 
whole of his tempestuous life, was to be one of the secrets 
of his tremendous influence. The superiority of his 
intellect and talents was becoming strikingly apparent. 
He learned all there was to learn at the pension Choquard, 
ancient and modern languages, mathematics for which he 
had a special aptitude, also music (he had an admirable 
voice) and drawing, accomplishments which were to be his 
recreations in prison. 

After he had finished his course at school, the time came 
when a decision had to be taken. The Marquis still com- 
plained of his son's headstrong and disobedient temper, 
and, faithful to the educational plan which he had laid 
down, thought only of "changing the leading-strings." 
He wanted "rather a rough school " and a "strong hand " 
for his son, and so he sent him to the Marquis de Lambert, 
a well-known martinet, who was in command of the Berri 
cavalry regiment at Saintes, where Mirabeau duly reported 
himself on July 19, 1767. The M'arquis de Lambert was 
wont to say that it fortified a man's lungs if he was com- 
pelled to breathe nothing but honour. Mirabeau was not 
at all averse from the proposed discipline ; he thought him- 
self a born warrior; and in fact the experiment for a time 
seemed to succeed well enough. But hardly a year had 
elapsed when, in consequence of losses at play and some 
other peccadilloes, he ran away from his regiment and took 
refuge with the Due de Nivernais in Paris. According to 
him, his colonel had twice grossly insulted him, the cause 
being, if Gabriel's account may be believed, a love affair 

29 



MIRABEAU 

in which he had supplanted his superior officer. His 
brother-in-law, the Marquis du Saillant, intervened; the 
affair was settled and Mirabeau escaped the severe punish- 
ment to which he had exposed himself. He could not, 
however, expect to escape scot free. His father, always 
inclined to violent courses, thought for a moment of 
sending him to the Dutch colonies, but ended by "caging" 
him in the island of Re, the citadel of which was under the 
command of the Bailli d'Aulan. The latter was soon under 
the fascination of his prisoner, to whom he allowed special 
privileges, and who managed to persuade him to intercede 
for the revocation of the lettre de cachet. 

When this had been granted, Pierre-Buffiere (for so he 
was still styled) joined the infantry legion of Lorraine 
under the command of Colonel de Viomesnil and was 
allowed to take part in the expedition to Corsica. Passing 
through Rochelle he had a duel with an officer which he 
had afterwards cause to regret, having been, as he said, 
more fortunate than he deserved. He embarked at Toulon 
on April i6, 1769. The expedition was short, but long 
enough to enable the young sub-lieutenant to prove his 
military capacity to the satisfaction of his chiefs. From 
Corsica, too, he brought back materials for a history of 
the island which was never written. His father was all 
but won over by these proofs of courage, industry and 
intelligence, and wrote to his brother: "As to talent and 
cleverness, he is perhaps unique. His brain is active : he 
works eight hours a day. But heaven knows what sort of 
a figure he will present." The Bailli was the first to see 
what figure his nephew made. Pierre-Buffiere landed at 
Toulon on March 8, 1770, and six days later, paid a 
surprise visit to his uncle at the Chateau de Mirabeau. 
The Bailli was charmed and much affected by this 
attention, and warmly welcomed the prodigal. He 
thought him ugly, but "behind the scars of the small-pox, 
and the great change in his appearance he has something 

30 



EARLY YEARS 

refined, graceful and noble." The conquest as usual was 
complete. In his letters to his brother the Bailli does not 
stint his praises. This youth of twenty-two "astonishes 
you by a world of thoughts and ideas, some of them very 
original, which his brain grinds out like a mill." With 
all his faults of exuberance and presumption natural at his 
age, his uncle thinks him upright and kindly, high-souled, 
and in truth a "genius" who (if he is not merely a skilled 
dissembler) will be "the fittest man in Europe to be a 
general or an admiral, a minister, a chancellor, or pope, or 
anything else he likes." 

He did, as a matter of fact, what he liked. He studied 
the lands of Mirabeau, drew up plans for dealing with 
the disastrous floods of the Durance, went shooting with 
the estate servants, who loved him, took notes and 
laboured in the fields with the peasants, who adored him. 
Every one who saw him came under the sway of his 
charm. He established an ascendency over the Abb^ 
Castagny, a distinguished agriculturist, who had been the 
Marquis's man of business, and whose chief delight it was 
to collect the favourable opinions of his favourite expressed 
by the officers of the Lorraine Legion, who were in 
barracks at Pont-Saint-Esprit. These praises were trans- 
mitted by the Bailli with untiring enthusiasm and 
solicitude, but they were received with obstinate in- 
credulity by his father. The Marquis attributed them to 
his son's plausibility, to his presumption, to what he calls 
his "imperturbable audacity." For his part he will not 
be convinced so easily; it would not do to allow this 
romantic ne'er-do-well, who had turned his uncle's head, 
to be out of leading-strings yet awhile. Let him read the 
Economics and the first two years of the Ephemerides du 
citoyen, in which is given the clarified essence of the 
ancient constitutions. Let him study also the Catechisme 
Economique and the preface to the Precis des elemens, 
the most elaborate of the works produced by his father 

31 



MIRABEAU 

in spite of his ill-health ! He was determined to make a 
country gentleman of theardentand impetuous young man, 
who wanted to be a soldier, or, rather, a sailor, for in the 
latter trade there was an opening for everybody's talents. 

Without taking a side the Bailli did his best to persuade 
his terrible brother, if not to be indulgent at least to 
"diminish the tension," and to relax a little the pressure 
of his sceptical and yet severe discipline. His own old 
method of correcting the faults of a young man consisted 
less in violent collisions with his inclinations, than in 
leading him insensibly to reflections and to seeing for 
himself the falsity of his calculations. On this subject 
he made in passing the really profound observation that 
"men never reform, except according to their own ideas." 
He went so far as to say that he would be glad to keep 
his nephew with him in order that he might complete his 
own education by his society. Nevertheless, having made 
sufficient trial of Gabriel's good disposition, he hastened 
to send him off to his father, whose good influence would 
correct his errors. The Marquis consented to receive his 
son, who arrived at Aigueperse in September 1770, and 
was received (so, at least, his father says) "kindly and 
even tenderly." He watched him closely, and lavished 
his advice and guidance. Though "his grotesque features 
often blunted" his father's eloquence, he "addressed him 
seriously on all subjects, sometimes kindly, sometimes 
severely." These lessons were well received by "M. le 
Comte de la Bourrasque," who (whether sincerely or 
otherwise) appeared desirous of turning over a new leaf. 
All his relations were soon reconciled to him, and ap- 
proached the head of the family with a view to persuading 
him to restore to Gabriel his proper name and title. The 
Marquis was softened and gave way, and Pierre-Buffiere 
again became the Comte Gabriel-Honore Riqueti de 
Mirabeau. 

The family to which he was thus restored was deeply 

32 



EARLY YEARS 

divided. The Marquis and his wife had been separated 
since 1762. Mme. de Pailly, a lady of wit and intelli- 
gence, but an intriguing person, who had for long been 
the Marquis's mistress, lived close by. The bad health 
of Mme. de Vassan, the Marquise's mother, pointed to 
her speedy departure. Her fortune was enormous, and 
she kept making and remaking her will. Who was to be 
the ultimate beneficiary? Among the relatives, whose 
private misunderstandings had been aggravated by pecu- 
niary difficulties, the children took sides. Mme. du 
Saillant was for her father, Mme. de Cabris took her 
mother's part. Mirabeau, who "thus began with the 
thorny side of family life," was employed by the Marquis 
to negotiate. He escorted his mother to the bedside of 
Mme. de Vassan, who died on November 4, 1770. 

The will, owing to its contradictory provisions, opened 
a series of new difficulties and lawsuits, which poisoned 
the family atmosphere for more than ten years. The 
young Count was caught in these fatal complications, 
and never emerged from the entanglement. He employed 
his formidable debating talents sometimes on behalf of 
his mother, sometimes on behalf of his father. Each of 
them experienced in turn his co-operation or his hostility. 
Gabriel throughout his life was destined to help without 
scruple and without restraint those whom he felt he could 
use most effectively for his own purposes. Against his 
father he used the most scandalous excesses of language, 
sparing neither his literary reputation, the dignity of his 
private life, or even his financial and domestic honesty. 
It was the Marquis's own fault. He had excited his son 
against his mother, and had allowed him to speak of her 
in an improper and even outrageous manner. He had 
thus killed all sentiments of filial respect, and could no 
longer expect to receive it. It was again left to the good 
Bailli to tell him the truth, which he did when he wrote, 
"You must know that you should never speak to a son 
^ 32 



MIRABEAU 

about his mother without a certain respect." Unfortun- 
ately in this violent and unbridled family respect was lost 
for ever. 

The Marquis was better advised when he associated the 
young Count with himself in the management of his estate 
in the Limousin. The country was devastated by famine. 
Mirabeau did his best to deal with it, not only by giving 
assistance, but by relief works. He lived in the midst of 
the peasants, ate with them, encouraged them and sup- 
ported them both with his words and with his presence. 
In this way he gained their confidence. Under the influ- 
ence of his father, who was always anxious to be doing 
something, he devoted himself to the establishment of 
a "Court of Husbandry," whose business it was to settle 
by the judgment of popularly elected arbitrators the 
disputes and differences of opinion arising in each parish. 
The object of the institution was "to avoid lawsuits, which 
are both costly and destructive of harmony. . . . Most of 
these cases," he said, "are mere misunderstandings, which 
in their early stages could easily be settled by a just man 
with a cool head." Is it not curious that these words could 
have been said towards the end of 1770, and that the author 
of the Ami des Hommes, this time really justifying his 
title, should have instituted a sort of elective tribunal 
resembling both our justices of the peace and our Conseils 
de prud' hommes? Mirabeau took the thing seriously. 
His suppleness, his shrewdness, his frankness and his 
activity triumphed over all difficulties, so said the Marquis, 
who thought the enterprise impossible. Every one was 
induced to co-operate, the clergy, the tenants, and the 
landlords. 

This *' glutton of the impossible" succeeded by his 
charm, by an innate and incomparable gift of pleasing, 
persuading, convincing, dominating all those with whom 
he came in contact. He found employment for these 
qualities at Paris, where his father let him come in 

34 



EARLY YEARS 

February 1771, though he had sworn not to let any of his 
sons set foot in the capital before they reached the age of 
twenty-five. "I am overwhelmed with kindness," wrote 
Gabriel to his brother-in-law, the Marquis du Saillant, 
"and I see that for the time being I have quite regained 
my father's affection." He appears to have made another 
conquest besides that of his father. "I hope to bring 
your wife's friend over to our side. She has the wit of 
five thousand devils, or angels, as you please, and she put 
me quite at my ease, much to my profit and pleasure." In 
later days he was to use very different language in speak- 
ing of Mme. de Pailly ! Meanwhile he pays calls, sees 
the Mar^chal de Broglie, the Due d'Orleans, the Prince de 
Cond^, the Carignans, the Noailles, and Mme. Elisabeth, 
then six years old, who naively asked whether he had been 
inoculated. He proved himself an insinuating person, who 
took the colour of his company. He astonished people by 
his ugliness, and disconcerted them by his manners, but 
he had too much wit and too much audacity not to please. 
In January 1771 his father had procured him a captain's 
commission in the dragoons; but as he thought this occu- 
pation "out of date," and as, moreover, his son was not 
on the active list, he did his best, but without success, 
to get him other employment. The young man threw 
himself on the libraries, where he worked with demoniacal 
energy in company with Gebelin the economist and the 
poet Lefranc de Pompignan. He spent the summer in 
the Limousin, where he was passionately interested and 
absorbed in his country duties; from thence he went to 
Le Bignon, and finally returned to Paris, where he com- 
plains of troubles that disturbed his life there. His father, 
"having been influenced against him, contrary to his real 
opinion," changed his attitude, called his son "a muddler 
and a spendthrift," and complained of "his indecent 
indiscretion and chatter." Mme. de Pailly's hostility had 
something to do with this. 

35 



MIRABEAU 

The Marquis, in fact, was tired of his son, and in Decem- 
ber 1 77 1 sent him away to Provence where he was charged 
to reduce to order the peasantry, among whom a recent 
regulation on the subject of wood and pasture had caused 
some "popular outbursts." The Count discharged his 
mission in circumstances about which it is difficult to obtain 
any clear information. The testimony, all of which is 
interested, is contradictory. On the one hand Mirabeau is 
represented as haughty, threatening and brutal, even to 
violence. Other witnesses praise his gentleness and 
dignity. The Abbe Castagny, in a letter to the Marquis, 
declares that "he has made himself loved by every one." 
He adds, " He is quick, but he has a good heart. He 
wishes to crush down all resistance, yet he pardons at the 
first word. This is the turning-point in his life. If they 
take to him the thing is done." The portrait is incomplete, 
but the likeness is undeniable. 

What, however, was "the turning-point" to which the 
good abbe refers ? I doubt very much whether he fore- 
saw by a gift of prophecy, which would have really been 
miraculous, the part which Mirabeau was destined to play 
in Provence. Does he allude to the Count's projected 
marriage with Mile, de Marignane, whose fortune of not 
less than five hundred thousand francs was attracting 
many high-born suitors? This had been talked of when 
he came back from Corsica. It was a scheme of the Bailli 
de Mirabeau; but another plan (itself afterwards aban- 
doned) had set it aside. " Do not regret this," wrote 
Mme. de Cabris to her brother, "her face is hideous, and 
she is very small." Was this unsparing portrait true tc 
life? Emllie de Marignane was certainly not pretty, but 
her eyes, which were very black and very fine, animated 
her rather heavy face with a certain brightness and tender- 
ness. Her hair was abundant, her teeth white, her mouth 
inclined to smiles and laughter ; her chin was round and 
thick, and her figure drooped too much to one side. The 

36 



EARLY YEARS 

first impression she produced was not favourable. She 
had the pertness of a monkey, but the Marquis, who 
was of this opinion, mitigated his condemnation a little 
by saying that she was "a melodious monkey." She had 
indeed an admirable voice, which she used with much 
skill. Was it this gift (which he shared) that attracted 
Mirabeau? This would be to judge too ill or perhaps 
too well of him. It was not the young lady but her fortune 
which interested him. She had been ill brought up by 
her father, who apart from his wife lived a dissipated, 
distracted and frivolous life. She was in reality rather 
shy, more malicious than intelligent, more sensible than 
passionate, and in fact entirely unsuited to him. She had 
neither the qualities nor the defects which were necessary 
to control his mind, or his heart, or his Herculean tempera- 
ment. He himself felt, and said, that he was "too mad," 
that his flight was too high and too unequal for her. 

Perhaps, too, he only married her out of pique at a sharp 
saying of his father, who had been irritated by his unsuc- 
cessful wooings, and in order to spite his rivals. These 
were both numerous and important. There were M. de la 
Valette, the Marquis de Grammont, the Vicomte de Cha- 
brillant, the Marquis de Caumont, and M. d'Albertas. 
Mirabeau re-entered the contest, and soon drove all other 
competitors from the field, and compromised the young 
lady by manoeuvres rendered all the easier because she 
was only too ready to give them her countenance. It was 
useless for the Marquis de Marignane to say to her, " I do 
not want M. de Mirabeau, and you shall not have him." 
He was obliged to yield and to rejoice in a union which, 
"so to speak, incorporated his family in one of those which 
are most highly respected in the country." 

The Ami des Hommes, for his part, also practised the 
virtue of resignation. He had taken the line of complete 
disinterestedness, and had affected to know nothing about 
it. They wanted his son : he gave but did not offer him, 

37 



MIRABEAU 

still less did he guarantee him. It was as if he knew 
nothing about him. Nor did he leave him at Aix, a town 
about the size of a snuff-box, where they might all have 
seen and appreciated and judged him at their leisure, and 
taken him, if they wanted, just as he was. A week before 
the wedding he wrote to his prospective daughter-in-law. 
After declaring, very untruthfully, that he ardently desired 
the honour and happiness of being allied to her, he added : 
"My son has his defects; no one knows them better, no 
one feels, and will feel them, perhaps, more than his father. 
But he has a good warm heart — aye, a noble heart, though 
he is imperious and spoiled by pride : in a word, he is my 
son, and some day you will know what that means. . . . 
I shall never forget that it is to you alone that I owe the 
advantages which are now conferred upon him. No doubt 
I should have left him under the eyes of your respected 
relatives at the time when they were good enough to think 
of allying themselves with him. It was for them to judge 
him, for such an engagement is so serious that it is impos- 
sible to wish any one to be deceived about it. But I was 
not unaware of the danger of such a long stay, of the im- 
prudence of 3^outh, the fatigue which in the end is caused 
by an impetuous character, the ill-nature of neighbours, 
the disadvantages which arise from the separation of the 
chief parties interested. I felt the peril of all this, and also 
that it was necessarily increased by the impossibility of my 
fulfilling the expectations which his boastful character 
could not fail to have aroused. I saw and felt all these 
difficulties, and 1 also clearly perceived that it was you 
alone who surmounted them. Once you had made up your 
mind after serious consideration, you prevailed upon the 
best of fathers, swept aside a passing dislike, and gave 
the help that was necessary to my son's protectors. It was 
you, Mademoiselle, who was in question, and it was you 
who gave yourself. . . ." 

It is not surprising that, as the Marquis was animated 

38 




THE COMTESSE DE MIRABEAU 
{From a pastel belonging to M. de Montvaloii) 



EARLY YEARS 

by sentiments such as these, he did not take part in the 
wedding festivities. The Bailli also absented himself, but 
was afterwards very sorry for it. Some years later these 
defections suggested to Mirabeau a reflection the truth of 
which can scarcely be contested. "Neither the Marquis 
nor his brother," he wrote, "nor any of the older genera- 
tion took the trouble to preside over a marriage by which 
the eldest son of their house was allying himself to one of 
the richest heiresses in the kingdom." The absence of the 
Marquise de Mirabeau, who had been separated from her 
husband for ten years, is less difficult to explain. The 
Marquis had written to his son in the postscript to a letter 
of May 9, 1772 : "All things considered (and consideration 
is necessary), you must wait for your mother's consent, and 
not fail to show her proper consideration." I cannot say 
whether or in what way Mirabeau followed this excellent 
advice, the source of which placed its disinterestedness 
beyond question. It is, at any rate, certain that his mother 
did not sign the contract, and did not answer the letter in 
which her son announced his marriage. 

The settlements offered by the Marquis de Mirabeau, 
according to Gabriel, were much inferior to what he had 
promised and to what was fitting in the circumstances. 
It must be remembered, however, that his financial posi- 
tion, however regarded, was neither clear nor brilliant. 
He made the Count an annual allowance of 6000 livres, 
which from 1773 was to be increased by annual increments 
of 500 livres to a maximum of 8500. M. de Marignane 
was even less generous, and, having regard to his fortune, 
much less to be excused. Out of a capital payable after 
his death and settled on his daughter, he advanced 8000 
livres on account of her trousseau, and undertook to pay 
her, in lieu of interest, an annual sum of 7000 livres. The 
dowager Marquise de Marignane made over to her grand- 
daughter a capital surrf of 60,000 livres, which, however, 
she was not to enjoy until her grandmother's decease. 

39 



MIRABEAU 

In return for a rent of 2400 francs the new establishment 
including servants and any children that might be born, 
was to be housed and maintained in her house at Aix. 

Thus, without counting presents and brilliant but un- 
certain expectations, Mirabeau and his wife had at their 
disposal an income of 8000 francs. As the result of his 
former extravagances, and also of the expenses contingent 
on the marriage itself, he already owed about four times as 
much. His father contributed 200 crowns towards this, 
which, in view of the great expense incurred, was little 
enough, as his steward pointed out. Mirabeau made a 
clean breast of his financial position, first to his fiancee and 
then to his prospective father-in-law, and expressed a wish 
that the marriage might be celebrated at Marignane in 
order to reduce the cost. This did not suit the Marquis's 
vanity, though in the circumstances it cannot be denied that 
Mirabeau showed both prudence and frankness. He was 
quite aware of the true character of his position. He 
foresaw both the debts of the future — debts which would 
be born of the debts of the past — and "the thousand and 
one troubles " which would arise, both for his wife and 
himself, from a union founded on resources so much out 
of proportion to the exigencies of their social position. 
This marriage was the capital error from which sprang 
the embarrassments, the expedients, and the mistakes (some 
of which deserved, perhaps, a harsher name) of his troubled 
career. 

According to the wish of the Marquis de Marignane, the 
marriage was solemnized at Aix on June 23, 1772, and the 
festivities lasted for a week. The expenses both for the 
bridegroom and for his father-in-law were very great. 
Mirabeau had to equip his wife, who had only one dress, 
make presents to her numerous friends, and to distribute 
largesse to the surroundipg countryside. The income of 
the first year of his married life was insufficient to meet 
his expenditure, and also the interest on his old debts, 

40 



EARLY YEARS 

There was nothing for it but to contract new obligations. 
The young couple went to Marignane, where Mirabeau, 
exasperated by the difficulties of his position and anxious 
with good reason about the future, gave himself up to 
excesses and acts of violence which did not spare even his 
wife. At Tourves, in the house of the Comte de Valbelle, 
a friend of his father-in-law, where there was held a cele- 
brated "court of love," formerly graced by Mile, de Marig- 
nane, his conduct was scarcely more decent. It was clear 
that the marriage was not sufficient to appease the ardour 
of his temperament. At Mirabeau, where the newly- 
married pair made a solemn entry, it was impossible to be 
less liberal to the villagers from the country round the 
chateau than to those at Marignane. Instead of coming 
to his son's assistance, the Marquis, whose meanness 
astonished even his agent, charged him with a heavy bill 
for legal expenses. Later on he refused even to give his 
receipt, which by the terms of the contract was indis- 
pensable, for an advance which the Marquis de Marignane 
offered to make to his son-in-law. 

The situation grew worse and worse. "In order to repair 
one breach," wrote Mirabeau, "it is necessary to make ten 
new ones. It is incredible how rapidly the swarm gathers." 
The swarm continually increased, so much so that Mira- 
beau soon gave up the unequal struggle. To live in the 
present, to stifle his memory of the past, and to turn away 
his eyes from the future, this, by his own confession, was 
the course of conduct he pursued, and it was, in fact, a 
kind of delirium. He doubled and tripled the number of 
his wife's diamonds, he insisted on her wearing "charming 
clothes," he carried out alterations at the castle, where he 
kept open house, and multiplied his charities and his 
largesses. This mad career of prodigality had in his eyes 
the excuse that, as he did not gamble, and as his debts 
were not due to immorality, he had no creditors but "Jews, 
workmen, booksellers or artists." Whatever their profes- 

41 



MIRABEAU 

sion, however, they were creditors none the less, who cried 
out when they were not paid. It was vain for the Count 
to try to smother their complaints by beating them. Their 
grievances soon came to the ears of M. de Marignane and 
the Marquis de Mirabeau. 

Something had to be done. In order to deliver his son 
from the insistence of his persecutors, most of whom were 
professional money-lenders, the Marquis solicited and 
obtained from the Due de la Vrilliere the "favour" of a 
lettre de cachet. An order from the King, dispatched on 
December 16, 1773, directed the Count not to leave the 
Chateau of Mirabeau. His wife, who had given birth to a 
son on October 8 at her father's house in Aix, came and 
joined him. It was a hard winter, but even more painful 
experiences awaited him in the following year. His debts 
amounted to a sum of between 180,000 and 200,000 livres, 
and his father secured that two further measures should 
successively be taken against him. In March 1774, he 
changed his place of exile; it was said that Gabriel was 
upsetting everything at Mirabeau, and he was compelled 
to take up his residence at the little town of Manosque. 
On June 8 of the same year the Marquis, after holding a 
family council, carefully "packed" by himself, induced the 
Lieutenant of the Chatelet to sentence him to deprivation 
of civil rights. This humiliating decision at least secured 
him comparative tranquillity, but, if we may believe Mira- 
beau, it was a terrible shock to him. 

The Count had been overtaken by another misfortune 
some days previously. At Manosque he had been living 
with a family named Gassaud, who had been friends of his 
own relatives for some time, and he had discovered that 
the son of the house, who was in the musketeers, was much 
more intimate than he ought to have been with the Com- 
tesse de Mirabeau. An intercepted letter had proved this 
beyond doubt, and the Countess herself confessed it. 
Mirabeau restrained himself. He yielded to the supplica- 

42 



EARLY YEARS 

tions of his wife, who was again about to become a mother, 
and to those of the musketeer's relations, and he forgave 
her. We must not, however, exaggerate his magnanimity 
on this occasion, for there was more than a little calculation 
in his attitude. No one who knew anything of him could 
doubt that there were grave faults on his side. Scarcely 
three months after his marriage he had written to his sister, 
Mme. du Saillant, "I am fat and well content, in spite of 
many exploits over which I draw a modest veil." These 
exploits and those which followed them perhaps palliated 
and excused the one faux pas of the Countess; but her 
husband's apparent generosity had other motives. He 
had everything to lose by taking action ; by holding his 
tongue, on the other hand, he put his wife under an obliga- 
tion which might be very useful to him later on. He made 
the Countess write — probably to his dictation — a letter to 
the musketeer, breaking off everything. He insisted on 
this letter being sent back, and he kept it. He announced 
his determination himself to the guilty lover in a grandilo- 
quent and declamatory epistle full of violence, and so 
devoid of dignity and measure that it is irresistibly comic. 
It was, in fact, a farce, which we must believe amused 
Mirabeau as much as any one, little as such a supposition 
redounds to the credit of his good feeling. 

He went so far as to arrange a marriage for his rival, 
whose engagement with the daughter of the Marquis de 
Tourettes had been broken off. The Marquis was a friend 
of Mirabeau, who did not wish to have the responsibility 
of the rupture. In order to effect a reconciliation he sud- 
denly left Manosque and rode off to Les Tourettes, a dis- 
tance of more than twenty leagues. This expedition might 
have passed unnoticed, or at any rate might have had no 
serious consequences, had it not been marked by an 
unforeseen incident. 

On his return from Les Tourettes Mirabeau took a fancy 
to stop and pay a visit to his sister at Grasse, which was 

43 



MIRABEAU 

at that time distracted by a public scandal. A certain 
rhymed broadside in honour of the ladies of Grasse — a 
stupid, coarse and obscene production — had been placarded 
on the doors of the most conspicuous houses and scattered 
broadcast. The design of this performance was attributed 
to Mme. de Cabris, and her husband was credited with 
its execution. Mirabeau's sister was a very pretty, seduc- 
tive and passionate woman, with a powerful tongue. Her 
husband was an invalid, and was threatened with insanity, 
and she made no secret of her liaison with a certain M. 
de Jausserandy, Seigneur de Verdache, and Co-Seigneur 
de Briangon. In later days Mirabeau hated his sister like 
poison, but at this time he was much attached to her, and 
his imprudence was such that this had actually given rise 
to compromising insinuations. One of their relations, 
M. de Villeneuve, who had done his best to spread the 
most calumnious reports arising out of the affair of the 
broadside, happened by chance to meet Mirabeau on 
August 5 in company with his sister, dressed in male 
attire, and the inevitable Brian9on. A collision was not 
long in coming. Mirabeau, exoited at least as much 
by a copious dinner as by the desire to avenge his sister's 
honour, snatched M. de Villeneuve's umbrella, broke it 
across his back, and closed with his antagonist. He after- 
wards wrote that "this could bring him nothing but the 
esteem and sympathy of decent people." This is hardly 
true; M. de Villeneuve was fifty, he was twenty-five, and, 
even admitting the justice of the quarrel, the fight was not a 
fair one. M. de Villeneuve was disavowed by his family, 
whose honour required a very different expiation in a 
matter of this sort, and he brought a charge of assault with 
intent to murder against Mirabeau. On August 22 a 
warrant for his arrest was issued. He had already taken 
refuge at Manosque, well knowing that his father's anger 
at this escapade might have the gravest consequences. 
How was the danger to be averted? He thought of his 

44 



EARLY YEARS 

wife, who was on affectionate terms with her father-in-law, 
and (sometimes without her husband's knowledge) kept up 
a constant correspondence with him. Three months before 
the Villeneuve affair the Marquis had written to her : "My 
dear, my dearest daughter, every day I esteem you more 
and, with more reason, apart altogether from the paternal 
tenderness which I have always had for you since your 
first letters. The last sentences of these are so well and 
so properly expressed, the thoughts are so wise that no 
one at any age could say anything better. Yes, my child, 
you are destined to be the point of union of two very 
honourable houses, and the prop and stay of their suc- 
cessors. You will fill the gap which must necessarily exist 
between the grandfather and the grandchildren, and you 
will fill it worthily. It shall not be my fault if all my 
mind and heart and all my experience are not placed at 
your disposal to enrich your excellent natural abilities. . . . 
Unlike Mme. de Cabris, your husband is not essentially 
wicked; indeed he is not wicked at all, for, though he is 
shameless, untruthful and irreligious, he is incapable of 
conspiring against me or even defying my authority in my 
own family. Though I have little hope, I am doing, and 
shall continue to do, all I can to save him yet again. . . . 
It is now most of all, my dear child, when both public and 
private censure are falling upon him, that your gentle and 
wise kindness, and the friendly and prudent common-sense 
of M. de Gassaud, must be relied on to melt the hardness 
which pride and madness have created in a heart not 
fundamentally bad." (April 20, 1774.) 

It will be seen that Mirabeau was not ill inspired in 
entrusting his wife with the delicate task of probing the 
angry feelings of his father and averting their worst conse- 
quences. The Countess owed him too much not to do him 
a service, the trouble of which was lessened by the pleasure 
of seeing the country, and of making acquaintances inside 
her family which were not without interest for her. Le 

45 



MIRABEAU 

Bignon was a great and pleasant domain. The Marquis, 
who had his poetic moments, described it very charmingly. 
"This expanse of greenery contains such a curious mixture 
of trees, thickets, water and tillage that you might say that 
it is a meeting-place for all the birds of the countryside." 
With the head of the family were there assembled the 
Bailli, the Marquis and the Marquise du Saillant, and 
Mme. de Pailly. 

The presence and the attitude of the last-named caused 
Mirabeau some anxiety, and formed the subject of a letter 
which he wrote to his wife on September lo. The com- 
mencement of this letter, after some reproaches addressed 
to the Countess on the subject of her silence, reveals in 
him a paternal tenderness for which he deserves credit. 
"Your son is very well ... he has been taken round all 
the good wives in the town, and his nurse is delighted 
beyond measure. It is curious how much he has grown 
and how clever he has become. He expresses everything 
with his little gestures, and he is marvellously quick. All 
the women are doing their best to spoil him, and I am 
quietly waiting my turn when he is out of the control of 
all these chattering creatures. You women arrogate to 
yourselves the exclusive charge of a boy's physical educa- 
tion in his early years, and Heaven knows whether you 
understand what you are about, I assure you I am not 
allowed to have any say in the matter. It is a slap here, 
a box on the ear there. They are all mothering him, and 
it is only in a doubtful sort of way that I am allowed to be 
called papa; for I have been convinced in spite of myself 
that Master Gogo pronounces this word perfectly. Heaven 
bless their ears ! " He goes on to rejoice that his wife's 
journey has resulted in convincing his uncle that "he had 
not covered himself with disgrace because he had a scuffle 
with a gentleman." It was necessary for him to take that 
journey, and neither he nor his wife had had any reason 
to regret it. "There are things which all honourable men 

46 



EARLY YEARS 

feel in unison if their feelings can be harmonized at all, 
and, though you know how far I am from hoping ever to 
be in unison with my father and my uncle, I venture to 
think that I am second to none in this respect. A letter 
from an indiscreet friend, or a reckless, a malignant or a 
hypocritical person, finds credence easily ; it is easy to 
believe the worst, I say, when the errors and passions of a 
young man have justly inspired distrust; but a personal 
explanation would efface the impression made by a hundred 
letters. Letters have no faces, and sooner or later a man's 
countenance reveals his soul. This very father, this very 
uncle, who could see nothing but unpardonable brutality 
and shocking want of self-control in the false version of the 
story, saw how honourable it was to me when they were 
better informed, and were all the more ready to take this 
view of the matter because*>at first they had been deeply 
grieved. The favourable judgment supplants the other, 
and indulgence gains the day. At the present moment, 
my dear, you have the matter by the right end. You may 
be sure that the two brothers will feel and think alike, and 
that they will have this form of pride more, perhaps, than 
anything else in the world, and that soon they will see, as 
they ought to see, that their name was more deeply con- 
cerned than I in this affair." (Unpublished letter, dated 
September lo, 1774.) 



47 



CHAPTER III 

FROM THE CHATEAU d'IF TO THE CHATEAU DE JOUX 

Mirabeau and his wife— His adventure at the Chateau d'lf — Confine- 
ment in the Chateau de Joux — M. de Saint-Mauris — Complaints of 
the prisoner, his destitution, his visits to Pontarher. 

At the moment when Mirabeau was so strongly express- 
ing his confidence in the future his fate had been decided. 
His flight from justice after the Grasse affair made a 
judicial settlement inevitable. To deliver his son from 
this, the Marquis informed his daughter-in-law that he 
had decided to apply to the Ministers for another lettre 
de cachet. He obtained it, as usual, with ease, and 
Mirabeau was brutally arrested, "like a pickpocket," at 
Manosque, and on September 20 was committed to the 
Chateau d'lf in the roadstead of Marseilles. His father's 
intention was to leave him there under probation for some 
time and then, if the governor testified to his good conduct 
and "repentance," to have him transferred to some other 
fortress; "if he emerges from this trial a better man it 
will be a miracle. I shall have others ready for him, and 
so on by degrees. I owe no less patience to his position 
as a husband and a father." What did the Countess do 
to mitigate the terrors of this scheme of surveillance and 
reformation ? The evasive tenderness of the letters which 
she wrote from Paris or Le Bignon does not show that she 
acted with much energy. Her husband begged her to 
come to him or to retire to her father's house at Aix, but 
she had no intention of rejoining her husband, and her 
excuses for not doing so irritated the Count and did not 
satisfy his curiosity. Finally she took offence at what she 

48 



THE CHATEAU D'lF 

called the " injustice " of her husband's tone, and gave up 
the vaguely skilful and prudent phrases at which she was 
an adept, simply alleging that she had her father's written 
order not to quit the roof of the Marquis de Mirabeau. 

This time the captive in the Chateau d'lf lost all 
patience and wrote: "You are a monster. You have 
shown my letters to my father. I will not ruin you as you 
deserve. My heart bleeds at the thought of sacrificing 
what I have loved so much, but I am not willing to be 
your dupe any longer, and I will not. Drag your disgrace 
where you will. Take your perfidy and duplicity further 
away from me, if possible, than you have done already. 
Farewell for ever." These terrible words have hitherto 
been given as a letter. In reality they are only a post- 
script. I have before me the whole letter, which is dated 
December 14, 1774, and is unpublished. All Mirabeau is 
in it — all his disconcerting and almost indefinable com- 
plexity, threatening and tender, domineering and ironical, 
abrupt and coaxing. It is worth while to quote the open* 
ing passage for the sake of its really striking rhetorical 
force. "Your first letter would be a cruel outrage if you 
had reflected on the force of what you were writing. 
Your father's ignorance of social and moral law does not 
surprise me; he has little intelligence, his heart is a 
weathercock; his opinions are never his own. My father's 
misunderstanding of that law is also not astonishing ; it is 
not the first injustice which he has committed, owing to 
his prejudice against me. But ordinary common sense 
might teach you that the civil contract called marriage, 
entered into before all men and placed by its very nature 
under the guardianship of society, annuls all other engage- 
ments and cannot be subordinated to any other authority 
but that which itself confers. The whole world knows 
that a father has no rights over a married daughter with- 
out the consent and privity of her husband, even to repress 
the most scandalous and dishonourable excesses. And 
E 49 



MIRABEAU 

even if all this were not the case your heart should have 
told you that no human authority but force could take 
you from under my protection, and that all advice tending 
to prevent you from coming to me to perform the duties of 
conjugal affection was cowardly, treacherous and con- 
temptible advice, and that all authority exercised in this 
sense was usurped and tyrannous. Your heart should 
have told you that a woman owes to the father of her 
children, to the companion of her fortunes and of her life, 
beyond any other being, a tribute of tenderness and atten- 
tion, and that she owes to no one but him, or, at any rate, 
to him before all others, what men call ' obedience.' You 
should, therefore, have told me of your father's so-called 
order, that I might be informed of it, but not in order to 
explain your conduct ; for, I repeat, to say to your husband, 
' I cannot come to see you, to help or to comfort you, 
although you urgently beg me to do so, because my father 
has forbidden me to stir from here,' is to offer him the 
most outrageous and unpardonable of insults." 

In spite of his complaints at the end of this very letter of 
the nitrous air of the country, which does not agree with 
him, and of the food, which is very bad, Mirabeau had 
reason to be grateful for the kindness and attention which 
he received at the Chateau d'If. His wife had written to 
him, "Use, my dearest, that magic which is always at 
your disposal when you wish to enchant some one." He 
had "enchanted" the governor of the fortress, M. 
d'All^gre, and kept up a clandestine correspondence with 
his mother and his sister, Mme. de Cabris. To the latter 
he sent the wife of the canteen keeper, whom he had com- 
promised. This facile affair left no remorse behind it. 
"There was only one woman at the Chateau d'If," he 
afterwards wrote to his father, "who had any resemblance 
to womankind. I was twenty-six. Was it a very grave 
crime in me to allow her to suppose that I thought her 
pretty?" This confession does not lack wit, and it must 

50 



THE CHATEAU DE JOUX 

be admitted that the record of Mirabeau's life might pass 
as irreproachable if it contained no worse episode than 
this youthful intrigue with the not too unkind canteen 
keeper of the Chateau d'If. 

The Marquis had learned through an indiscretion of his 
second son Boniface of the relations which existed between 
his eldest son, his wife and his daughter. He feared what 
might come of a coalition so threatening to his interests, 
and this, even more than the favourable reports from the 
authorities at If and Marseilles on the prisoner's conduct, 
led him to decide on transferring his son "to a more 
suitable place," where he would enjoy a semi-liberty. 
From If Mirabeau was sent on May 25 to the Chateau de 
Joux near Pontarlier, and was placed in the custody of the 
governor, M. de Saint-Mauris, being his only prisoner. 
"Banished to a nest of owls in the land of the bears," he 
did not at first appear to find much amelioration in the 
change of which his father had made such a favour. His 
relations with his wife, whose excuses for not joining him 
were very maladroit, 'had become embittered. "I am 
willing to believe, madame," he wrote, "that you have 
not realized how infallibly you disgrace yourself by your 
proposal to go to your father and avoid me on my return. 
As on this occasion it will be impossible to attribute your 
behaviour to my misconduct, how do you suppose people 
will view your absence on the return of the unfortunate 
husband whom you have already abandoned? If you 
examine your own conscience, madame, you will be less 
distressed at what I have said than at the fact that you 
have given occasion for me to say it." 

In this letter Mirabeau gives some curious details about 
his personal situation. "The only liberty I have is liberty 
to shoot, and I am in a country where there is no shooting. 
Even if there were, my legs are too full of gout to carry 
me. There is no town, none, at any rate, that I am 
allowed to visit, though it were only a quarter of a league 

51 



MIRABEAU 

away. I have no society and no books, and in fact I have 
left one prison where my hardships were softened by kind- 
ness for the coldest and most dismal part of Europe. I beg 
you will tell my father that I have not had a sou since I 
came here, where I was brought penniless by order of the 
all-powerful du Bourguet (the Marquis's confidential 
agent). I am in the most cruel embarrassment, and came 
here, moreover, dressed in camlet, whereas woollen is too 
light for summer clothes here, where everything was 
covered with snow on May 30 and where there was not a 
leaf to be seen in the first week of June." When he was 
writing this letter (hitherto unpublished) on June 11, 1775, 
was Mirabeau telling his wife the exact truth about his 
position, or was he exaggerating his troubles in order to 
excite her compassion and to secure her intervention with 
the Marquis ? There is reason to believe that the severity 
exercised by M. de Saint-Mauris towards his prisoner was 
not so rigorous as it was represented. In any case it was 
not long before his heart was softened. Mirabeau, always 
an indefatigable reader and taker of notes, was allowed 
to have books. He could go to Pontarlier when he liked, 
and the new gaoler carried his kindness so far as to ask 
him to his parties. It was at one of M. de Saint-Mauris's 
dinners in June that Mirabeau made an acquaintance which 
was destined to have a decisive influence on his life. 



52 



CHAPTER IV 

MIRABEAU AND SOPHIE DE MONNIER 

The Marquis de Monnier and his wife — The Essay on Despotism — 
Seduction of Sophie by Mirabeau — His escape from Fort de Joux — 
Flight to Holland — Pamphlets and other works — Arrest and extra- 
dition of Mirabeau. 

Sophie de Ruffey was the daughter of a President of the 
Chambre des Comptes of Dijon, and at the age of seven- 
teen had married the Marquis de Monnier, first President 
of the Chambre des Comptes at Dole, who was then not 
under sixty-five. The Marquis had contracted this 
alliance solely for the purpose of punishing his daughter 
by a former marriage, who, after a scandalous struggle in 
the law courts, had married against her father's will a 
certain musketeer named De Valhadon, by whom she had 
been compromised. Sophie's husband was a miser and a 
bigot, though not unkindly ; his house was like a convent, 
and his young wife lived with him quite resigned to the 
dull domesticity of her existence. This went on for 
eighteen months or two years, during which nothing seems 
to have disturbed their very bourgeois tete-a-tete. 

Then came a sudden change. M. de Saint-Mauris, a 
friend of the Marquis, came on the scene and did his best 
to enliven the lonely household. He was a man of sixty, 
but he made love to the young wife who moped in solitude. 
She evaded his advances, but temptation, however un- 
attractive, had come her way, and it was enough to reveal 
to Mme. de Monnier, then nineteen, what a tedious 
existence she was leading. She formed acquaintanceships 
with women of her own age, some of whom were not 

53 



MIRABEAU 

irreproachable. She asked them to her house, and held 
gatherings of "the brilHant and the fashionable." 
Theatricals were organized, and the poetry of Zaire ex- 
cited her imagination, more particularly when a modest 
young Orosmane was bold enough to pay court to her. 
This amusement remained innocent, especially as she was 
saved by the timidity of her lover, but soon he was 
succeeded by an artillery officer, M. de Montperreux, who 
was bolder, and was rewarded by money, letters, even a 
portrait. That was already much, but it was all, if we 
may trust the account given by the heroine of this im- 
prudent affair. It was in any case enough to compromise 
her and to give rise to gossip in the little town. Her 
reputation, if not her virtue, was therefore far from being 
intact when Mirabeau saw her for the first time. It was not 
a case of love at first sight on either side. Mirabeau's 
passions had other employment in the household of the 
Procureur du Roi, and Mme. de Monnier was less disturbed 
by passion than by the ardour of the imagination and the 
emptiness of her heart. During the summer months they 
did not meet. 

Mirabeau was occupied with the chase and with reading. 
He had begun a book on The Salt Marshes of Franche- 
Comte, for he could never be inactive. In the previous 
year, during his exile at Manosque, he had written an 
Essay on Despotism in the midst of the gravest pre- 
occupations, and indeed while his very liberty was at stake. 
This book appeared anonymously in November 1775, with 
a motto from Tacitus, Dedimus profecto grandis patientice 
documentum. It is an uninteresting compilation in which 
it is impossible to discover a single original idea worth 
remembering in the midst of a series of dull reminiscences 
of other books and a mass of violent declamation. At 
the utmost we may give the young author of twenty-seven 
credit for supporting the benefits of civilized society 
against the theory of Rousseau, of whose genius, eloquent 

54 



MIRABEAU AND SOPHIE DE MONNIER 

elegance and rectitude he was already a professed ad- 
mirer. All the rest is tediously diffuse and long. No 
one has judged this first effort, whose very title is saved 
from oblivion by the subsequent glory of the author, more 
severely than Mirabeau himself. "This book is detest- 
able," he said, "for a book does not consist of a mass of 
details, and what I wrote is a mere tissue of rags put 
together in any order and stamped with all the defects 
natural to my age when I wrote it. It has neither plan 
nor form nor method nor correctness." Such as it is, it 
was at any rate an audacious venture, and the Government, 
whose foundations it attacked and whose abuses it de- 
nounced, ordered an inquiry. An imprudence on the part 
of Mirabeau, the fears of M. de Saint-Mauris who had 
facilitated the excursions of the author into Switzerland, 
where the volume was printed, and perhaps also a certain 
amorous jealousy felt by the Governor of the Chateau de 
Joux, produced a catastrophe. 

Autumn had brought Mirabeau and Mme. de Monnier 
together. Their meetings had become more frequent and 
their intimacy more close. The young woman, invited to 
tell the story of her life, had poured out her troubles, not 
concealing her imprudent conduct with M. de Montper- 
reux. The latter was in garrison at Metz, where he did not 
fail to recount and perhaps to exaggerate his successes. 
Mirabeau offered to go and recover the letters and the 
portrait. Did he go? He says he did in the passionate 
Dialogue in which he tells the story of his adventure. 
But we may hesitate to believe that he did go, as the 
narrative, both as regards the character of the persons 
described and the conversation they hold, manifestly owes 
less to the fidelity of his memory than to the magic power 
of his eloquence. 

Moreover, whether from gratitude, from weakness or 
from love, Sophie gave way. For her it was fate, and she 
defended herself very feebly : Mirabeau was to complete 

55 



MIRABEAU 

what two lovers less bold or less successful had com- 
menced. He was weary of the commonplace affairs which 
even at Pontarlier had been enough to satisfy him. His 
wife, insensible to the eloquence of "the most powerful, 
the most moving, the most sparkling and vivid of letters," 
refused to share his fortunes, sent him a few cold lines and 
obviously intended to forsake him. The Marquis de 
Mirabeau remained indifferent to his son's appeals. The 
Bailli himself left to his elder brother the task of answering 
a letter which his nephew had addressed to him in August, 
though the petition it contained was sincere, plaintive and 
prophetic. "This is an age of regeneration," wrote Mira- 
beau, "an age of ambition, and let me ask you whether 
you think that your nephew, who is over twenty-six, is 
good for nothing. No, my dear uncle, you do not think 
so. Raise me, therefore, deign to deliver me from the 
terrible ferment in which I am, and which may have the 
effect of destroying the good which my meditations and 
trials have done me. Some men must have occupation. 
Activity, which can do everything, and without which we 
can do nothing, becomes turbulence when it has neither 
employment nor object." 

This "terrible ferment," which acted alike on Mirabeau's 
mind, spirit and sense, threw him into the arms of Mme. 
de Monnier. Though deeply stirred he hesitated. He 
says he hesitated, and I believe him, because whereas he 
had hitherto known nothing outside his ill-assorted 
marriage but "the intercourse of gallantry, which is not 
love but rather its counterfeit," he now felt himself being 
dragged into a genuine passion. Kte has also said, "I was 
terribly afraid of love," and from such a man such a 
confession is convincing. His too was the image, the 
poetry of which should not obscure its ingenuity, which 
he applied to his own case when he said of his wife, "I 
was wrong to look for fruit from a tree which bore only 
blossom." 

56 



MIRABEAU AND SOPHIE DE MONNIER 

Blossom and fruit were both offered to him at a time 
when everything induced him to gather. Sophie was 
twenty-one. She was tall, dark, plump, well made and 
vigorous. Her complexion was fresh and clear, her hair 
and eyes were black, her eyelids short, her forehead broad, 
her face round with a tip-tilted nose, fine teeth and a 
short chin. She stammered a little, and her head drooped 
slightly on one shoulder. She was scarcely to be called 
pretty, but she was, perhaps handsome, and undoubtedly 
attractive with her gentleness, her sensibility, her natural 
wit, her innocent playfulness, her longing for affection, 
and her unselfish kindness. 

As for him, he was tall ; his huge head was placed on 
broad, heavy shoulders. His face was swollen and scarred 
with small-pox ; his hair was woolly ; his brown eyes took 
a tawny shade when he was preoccupied, which was veiled 
when he wished to please. His nose was large, his mouth 
thin with even rows of teeth ; his skin was white and his 
hands beautiful. He jested wittily about his ugliness, 
which with a touch of coquetry he was wont to exaggerate. 
Voluptuous and ardent, the vigour of his constitution was 
beyond his control. His imagination was "sulphurous," 
and passionate and grave and even petulant moods alter- 
nated |vith fits of excessive sensibility, impatience and even 
fury. He was always inclined to violence, but he con- 
trolled himself more easily in great troubles than in small. 
" I do not cry out when I am angry ; I would throw down 
a wall, I would bite red-hot bullets, but I would not cry 
out." His voice was admirable, tender, flexible, caressing, 
and he used it with consummate skill. When he wished 
to charm none could resist him, neither lords nor peasants, 
neither his mistresses nor his gaoler^. Dazzling and 
bewilderiing, outspoken and a liar, braggadocious and 
sincere, an original and a plagiary, a born and accom- 
plished actor, he could descend from the most lofty 
speculations to the commonest triviality and the most 

57 



MIRABEAU 

revolting obscenity. His rapid gestures, his mobile 
glances, his bursts of laughter lit up his versatile and 
brilliant conversation, in the course of which he lavished 
the rich accumulations of his wide reading, enhanced by 
his reflections. In a word he was "a splendid exaggera- 
tion." This expression was applied by his father to his 
sister, but it is even more true of him. She extinguished 
her passions in a convent, while her brother, more auda- 
cious and energetic, flaunted his in the world; they were 
his glory and his pride ; he was their slave, and to them 
he enslaved others. Sophie submitted at once. It was the 
contrast between them that brought them together, that 
attracted and kept them to each other. "My character is 
uneven," he wrote; "I wanted a kindly and indulgent 
woman to be my joy, and I could not hope that these 
precious qualities should be combined with much rarer 
and, in the opinion of most people, incompatible virtues. 
Nevertheless, my dearest wife, I found them all combined 
in you." He gives his mistress this title of "wife," which 
in the eyes of women justifies their weakness and flatters 
their adultery with the hope or merely with the simulacrum 
of marriage, in a letter dated December 13. This promise, 
which flattered in the most delightful manner the ears of 
the young woman, conquered her hesitation and her 
resistance, and the words in which she answered, "My 
dearest . . . my all," confessed her irrevocable fall. The 
Marquise de Monnier as a historical figure became simply 
Sophie. 

An affair of this kind, which in a large town might have 
remained hidden, could not long remain unknown at 
Pontarlier. M. de Saint-Mauris soon saw how things 
were, and his discovery made itself felt in his relations 
with his prisoner. Mirabeau always attributed his 
changed attitude to jealousy. The governor of the chateau 
was not merely answerable for his safe-keeping, he was 
responsible to the captive's father for his conduct, on 

58 



MIRABEAU AND SOPHIE DE MONNIER 

which depended what decision he would take as to his 
son's future. In January 1776 he learned from a note of 
hand in circulation that Mirabeau had contracted a debt of 
1500 livres to a bookseller at Neuchatel. This was aggra- 
vated by the circumstance that the advance was made in 
payment for the Essay on Despotism which he had pub- 
lished. M. de Saint-Mauris saw what risks he was 
running, and ordered Mirabeau to return to the chateau, 
to which he was henceforth to be confined. Mirabeau had 
been invited to a ball given by M. de Monnier at Pontar- 
lier in his honour, and begged for a respite of four days. 
The governor granted this favour, which in the circum- 
stances certainly seems to free M. de Saint-Mauris from 
the charge that he was driven to severity by jealousy. 

Instead of returning to the chateau, Mirabeau wrote the 
governor an insulting letter in which he announced his 
intention of removing himself from M. de Saint-Mauris's 
tyranny. He spent the night of the ball actually at the 
house of M. de Monnier and then went into hiding at 
Pontarlier. On the night of February 16, he was detected 
by M. de Monnier's servants when in the act of visiting 
his mistress. Nothing daunted he demanded to see the 
President, on whose credulity he played by means of a 
madly improbable story told with extraordinary effrontery. 
Lulled into security by his wife's lover in a scene worthy 
of the most farcical comedy, the unlucky husband 
authorized Mme. de Monnier to go to her relations at 
Dijon. Of course Mirabeau, who had arranged this journey 
with Sophie, went there too. On the evening of his arrival, 
knowing that Mme. de Monnier was going to a ball given 
by M. de Montherot, Grand Provost of Burgundy, he had 
the extravagant impudence to go to the party himself 
under the name of the "Marquis de Lancefoudras." M. 
de Montherot did not make too much of the incident, but 
he could not be unaware of Mirabeau's irregular position, 
and he asked for the orders of the Minister. Immediately 

59 



MIRABEAU 

after the flight from the Chateau de Joux, M. de Male- 
shcrbes had received contradictory petitions from the 
Marquis de Mirabeau and from the Marquise. The father 
was, of course, hostile to his son, while the mother vehem- 
ently pleaded his cause. After somewhat protracted 
negotiation the Minister gave orders that Mirabeau should 
be confined in the castle of Dijon, but with a fairly large 
measure of liberty to be regulated by the Grand Provost. 
Then on the advice of a special committee, he decided on 
April 30 that Mirabeau should be transferred to DouUens. 
Shortly after this he retired and Mlirabeau asserted that he 
sent him word that his best course was to go abroad and 
make his way while his affairs were settling down in 
France. It is not improbable that he did so. In any case 
Mirabeau, either spontaneously or as the result of this 
advice, decided to make his escape. He had as usual won 
over those who had charge of him ; the Grand Provost and 
the governor of the castle treated him more as a friend 
than as a prisoner, and on the night of March 24-25, he 
fled from Dijon and reached Verri^res in Switzerland. 

As he had not succeeded in re-entering the army in 
spite of a pathetic appeal to the Minister of War, or in 
justifying himself as he continually asked to be allowed 
to do before a court of law, perhaps this was his only 
course. But what was he to do ? And what was Sophie 
to do? Mirabeau felt that "it would be absolute madness 
to carry her off," but unluckily he had got himself into 
"such a position that everything he did was wrong." 
Mme. de Monnier, shut up by her family, watched, spied 
upon, threatened with the Salpetri^re or with a convent, 
had, or thought she had, to choose between death and 
flight. Was Mirabeau to "let her drink the fatal cup?" 
To his honour it must be said that this never occurred to 
him. Sophie tried to join him at Verri^res; she failed. 
Mirabeau, on whose tracks the Ruffey family had set the 
police, was forced to fly to Savoy. His sister, Mme. de 

60 



MIRABEAU AND SOPHIE DE MONNIER 

Cabris, her lover, Brian9on, and her cousin, Mile, de la 
Tour-Baulieu, a young lady of twenty-three, joined him 
at Thonon on June i6. It was an extraordinary affair. 
Mirabeau did not fail to seduce the young cousin w^ho, 
though engaged to be married, made little resistance. 
Pursued by two detectives, sent after his son by the 
Marquis de Mirabeau, Mirabeau and Brian9on succeeded 
in throwing them off the scent, and went to Geneva to 
the Chateau de la Balme, to Lorgues in Provence, whence 
Mirabeau, now alone, suddenly set off on August 13, 
via Piedmont, the Alps and Switzerland, to meet Sophie 
at Verri^res. She had by this time succeeded in gradually 
relaxing the surveillance under which she was kept, and 
joined him there on the night of August 24. Her flight 
was not noticed until the hour of evening prayers, which 
were said every night in the house of her family. 

Was this an abduction ? Mirabeau denied it, and the 
circumstances gave some colour to his contention. It 
even appears that he tolerated rather than suggested or 
planned Sophie's departure. His letters to Mme. de 
Cabris prove how much he hesitated. His own flight 
abroad might relieve his difficulties, on the other hand 
Sophie's presence embarrassed him and made his position 
worse in every way. It was not blind passion that could 
have influenced his decision. No doubt he loved Mme. de 
Monnier, who in spite of her imprudence and misconduct 
was very different from the lights of love of whom he 
had met so many. But a profound and durable attach- 
ment was not in his nature. What bound him to Sophie 
was not his love for her, but her passion for him. He 
found her "less capable of the passions of the senses than 
of those of the soul " ; he awoke sensual passion in her, 
and with her soul she had given him her life. She was 
distinctly unlike the other women he had known. She 
was gentle, and to all appearance calm, but "the passions 
of a gentle woman, though perhaps more difficult to 

61 



MIRABEAU 

arouse, are infinitely more ardent than those of any other, 
and are really invincible once they are well alight." By 
such a flame Sophie's heart was being devoured. Her 
choice was "Gabriel or death," and nothing could induce 
her to contemplate any third possibility. "Listen, I can 
no longer endure this state of suffering; it is too terrible 
to be far away from my husband and to know that he is 
unhappy. Let us be together, or let me die. If I stay 
here I shall never see next year, I neither can nor wish to. 
. . . To live apart from you is to die a thousand times 
every day. . . . Shall I never receive the signal for my 
departure? You told me that we should live quietly, 
sufficient for each other, that you would learn languages, 
music, painting. No doubt you still think so, and as for 
me I am ready for anything. What does it matter 
whether I work at home or in a shop, or as a children's 
governess, or as anything you like, provided we are to- 
gether? There is nothing I will not do in order to be 
reunited to you. Nothing would frighten me. My 
present condition is terrible, I can support it no longer; 
there must be an end of it, and again I say Gabriel or 
death ! " 

Was it merely this cry for help, this recall to his 
"plighted troth," that induced Gabriel to respond. He 
always said so, not seeing that he was taking away from 
love what he sacrificed to pity and honour. Perhaps, 
however, there was another motive. In a moment of lone- 
liness and exasperation he had had the monstrous and 
criminal folly to write an abominable letter to Sophie, 
falsely accusing himself of the horrible crime of having 
seduced his sister, Mme. de Cabris. This letter had been 
lost, or, rather, not lost but intercepted, owing to the 
surveillance with which he was constantly surrounded, or 
to the treachery of a messenger. How was he to resist the 
publication of this infamous though stupid document, 
which would be a terrible weapon in the hands of his 

62 



MIRABEAU AND SOPHIE DE MONNIER 

father ? It would ruin all his plans, break all his defences, 
and would deliver him up to the malevolence of all his 
own relations, and those of his wife alike, who would be 
united against him by disgust. Where could he find 
refuge ? Sophie called him, and he flew to Verri^res. 
Is it necessary to go further and denounce another and 
not less odious aberration ? Mirabeau always denied with 
indignation the charge brought against him by Sophie's 
relatives of having "carried off Mme. de Monnier in order 
to appropriate her money." This " infamous accusation " 
left him "speechless." Unfortunately it is not altogether 
possible to accept the testimony of witnesses afterwards 
examined at the inquiry, though it is precise and coherent. 
There are letters from Sophie and also letters from 
Mirabeau, which, though they do not confess all, say 
enough to form material for melancholy revelations. 
Neither Mirabeau 's genuine poverty nor the morality of 
his time can excuse his weakness. It is but too true that 
money was destined to be the incurable sore in his life ! 

The fugitive couple, after three weeks spent at an inn 
at Verri^res, where the police did not succeed in catching 
them, left on September 15 for Holland. This country 
had an active and celebrated publishing trade, from which 
Mirabeau hoped to make a living. They took up their 
abode at Amsterdam, and the first news they heard from 
France was the conclusion of the Villeneuve affair. 
Mirabeau was sentenced in his absence to pay a fine of 
6000 livres to M. de Mouans, and to make a humiliating 
apology. 

He immediately set about looking for work, introduced 
himself to the bookseller Rey as the author of the Essay 
on Despotism, and offered his services. He added, "I 
know several languages, and have much facility and the 
will and the need to work." The work he sought did not 
com.e to him for two or three months, and at first con- 
sisted of translations from English, which Mirabeau had 

63 



MIRABEAU 

learned without assistance. He understood or could read 
five or six languages. He had been taught Latin, but he 
had had "to re-learn it," a fact which inspired the follow- 
ing interesting reflection, which is of some pedagogic 
value: "As a rule schoolmasters learn to study and 
nothing more." His views on the study of foreign lan- 
guages are equally original ; they were in advance of his 
time, and indeed it is only now that we are able to see 
how fruitful they are. "As for speaking, a master could 
not teach you more than you can learn all by yourself 
by seeking out natives and conversing with them. When 
you feel the want of a dictionary, ask. Get the English 
papers, which are in every one's hands, and in the process 
of amusing yourself you will begin to understand." 

Mirabeau worked from six in the morning till nine 
o'clock at night, and has given a charming description of 
his life. "An hour's music rested me after my work, and 
my adorable companion, who, though she had been 
brought up and accustomed to opulence, was never so gay, 
so brave, so attentive, so placid and so tender as in her 
days of poverty, made my life beautiful. She copied 
extracts for me, she worked, read, painted, corrected 
proofs. Her unchanging gentleness, her inexhaustible 
sympathy, were developed in their full strength. The 
brush falls from my hand — I cannot finish the picture." 
In order to complete it we may add that Sophie was as 
good as her word, and gave lessons in Italian. 

In addition to the translations by which he made his 
living, Mirabeau was engaged on work of his own. He 
had been a Free Mason since his youth, and among his 
papers in the hand of a copyist has been found a scheme 
for the international organization of Free Masonry, which 
he no doubt dictated at Amsterdam. This draft contains 
views on the solidarity of mankind, the advantages of 
education, and on "the reform of systems of government 
and legislation," which are much superior to those ex- 

64 



MIRABEAU AND SOPHIE DE MONNIER 

pressed in the Essay on Despotism. Mirabeau's mind 
had matured. The duties which lie lays down for the 
"brothers of the superior order" contain, in fact, what 
amounts to a plan of reform very similar in some parts 
to that afterwards carried out by the Constituent Assembly. 
Among his suggestions are the suppression of feudal servi- 
tudes connected with the land and of the rights of mort- 
main, abolition of corvees, of guilds and mysteries, of 
customs and excise. He advocated the reduction of im- 
posts, religious toleration, the freedom of the press, and the 
suppression of special jurisdictions. For the organization 
and development necessary to success, Mirabeau quotes 
the example of the Jesuits. ''Our aims," he observes, "are 
very different. We wish to enlighten men and make 
them free and happy ; but we can and should achieve our 
end by the same means, and what is to prevent us from 
using for a good purpose what the Jesuits have used for 
an evil one ? " 

His Avis aux Hessois, a work of lofty and generous 
intention, protested vehemently against the sale of soldiers 
by the Prince of Hesse, who exported them to England 
for use against the American rebels. In spite of its 
repetitions and an over-declamatory tone, this protest is 
rapid, lively and vigorous, though there is in it more of 
the orator than the author. It was, however, in his answer 
to a pamphlet directed against the Avis that we find 
Mirabeau's ideas on the duties of Government and the 
rights of peoples. This reply is both strong and clever, 
and in it wit comes to the assistance of argument. It is 
very French in form, and already we hear a menacing 
note. Declarations like this were not addressed to Hesse 
alone. "When authority becomes arbitrary and oppres- 
sive; when it attacks property for the protection of which 
it was created; when it breaks the contract which at once 
assured and limited its rights, resistance becomes a duty 
and cannot be called rebellion." 
F 65 



MIRABEAU 

About the same time, that is to say in the early months 
of 1777, Mirabeau sent to the Amsterdam newspapers an 
essay entitled Le Lecteur y mettra le Titre, which bears 
witness to the extraordinary suppleness of his intelli- 
gence. Music, which he had studied in his youth, was 
one of his favourite recreations. Concerts of vocal and 
instrumental music were being given at Amsterdam, which 
he was careful not to miss, and he would even go as far as 
the Hague to gratify his taste. The concerts were very 
well attended, but Mirabeau had no illusions about the 
various motives which attracted the audience. "At 
Amsterdam," he wrote, "one goes to concerts because it is 
one way of meeting people in a country where there is 
no society, because if one doesn't like music one does like 
to see pretty and, above all, agreeable women, because 
ladies who know nothing of the art of combining sounds 
are at least observed, and to be observed is worth while 
when one knows or hopes that one deserves such an atten- 
tion." This description is true of more places than 
Amsterdam in 1777. 

Mirabeau himself was there to hear, to understand and 
to criticize, and on the occasion of the production of two 
new symphonies he set forth his ideas about music. Le 
Lecteur y mettra le Titre is like one of Diderot's head- 
ings, and the essay itself recalls Diderot's lucid and 
witty alertness of manner. Mirabeau proclaims himself 
a disciple of Rousseau, for whom he never missed an 
opportunity of expressing his admiration, but he is none 
the less bold and original. He abounds in happy formulae, 
such as "everything, including silence, is included in what 
melody can express," and "the poet engages my mind, the 
musician stirs my heart." Is the following applicable 
only to 1777, or does it not apply even now in the criticism 
of certain music ? " It is not my purpose to inquire here 
whether since the invention of counterpoint harmony has 
not been allowed to shine at the expense of melody, as it 

66 



MIRABEAU AND SOPHIE DE MONNIER 

is easier to be learned than to be inventive, whether this 
excessive ornamentation has not impoverished music and 
whether the diversity of parts introduced by harmony and 
the complexities of the harmonies themselves have not 
been injurious to melody." 

Mirabeau expounded with a striking propriety of expres- 
sion the relation between music and poetry, and the 
mutual assistance they can render. His essential thesis 
is the defence of instrumental music, "which is, and always 
will be the principal object of the composer, the basis of 
his art, the highest expression of his talent." He lays 
down conditions, laws and limits, and apart from 
Rousseau, I know no one who at the end of the eighteenth 
century wrote about music with more power and more art 
than Mirabeau. This is too little known, and it is to me 
a pleasure as well as an act of justice to restore to him the 
accomplishment by which he gave evidence of an unex- 
pected characteristic of his wide, complex and versatile 
intelligence. 

There was also in Mirabeau a polemical controversialist. 
Unhappily for him he chose at this point in his career to 
turn his formidable gift against his father. In the pre- 
ceding year he had allowed his mother and his sister to 
turn into a memoir, with "an ill-constructed and ill- 
written" introduction, the letters he had written to M. 
de Malesherbes, in which ihe did not spare the Ami des 
Hommes. The odious imputation he had made against 
Mme. de Cabris violently irritated his mother, whose 
favourite daughter she was, and who had always been a 
faithful ally in the quarrels with M. de Mirabeau, even 
going so far as to furnish money to keep her lawsuits 
going. Summoned to explain himself, Mirabeau impu- 
dently denied having written the abominable letter in 
question, and this appeased the Marquise. She even 
ceased to insist on Mirabeau sending back Sophie "to her 
honoured husband." She even allowed Mme. de Monnier 

67 



MIRABEAU 

to call her "mamma" in the same way as she referred to 
her daughter's lover as "my son-in-law Brian9on." It 
was in this way that she repaid the services rendered by 
her children against their father. 

Mirabeau had drawn up for her a certain Precis which 
is lost, but which the Marquis said surpassed in violence 
all that had appeared against him. Another pamphlet 
was coming out in Holland under the promising title, An 
Anecdote worthy to be added to the voluminous collection 
of Philosophic Hypocrisies, and under the pretext of 
replying to a benevolent criticism of the Essay on Despot- 
ism, in the Gazette Litteraire d' Amsterdam, Mirabeau 
told the story of the principal events of his life. Had he 
been content to keep to defending himself and to describing 
all his actions as actuated by sensibility, patriotism and 
honour, there would not have been much to be said. The 
reader might even have approved such a happy phrase as 
this : " Deprived of counsel and guidance, I was a young 
and lusty tree tormented by sap, throwing out greedy 
branches which a skilful gardener would have carefully 
pruned and cultivated." But the Anecdote was in reality 
merely another deliberate attack on the Marquis. One 
sentence is enough to show the tone in which it was 
written. "It is notorious," he wrote, "that the ' friend of 
man ' has been the friend neither of his wife nor of his 
children, that he preaches virtue, beneficence and frugality, 
while he is the worst of husbands and the hardest and most 
spendthrift of fathers." 

This attack was inopportune. For several months the 
Marquis, acting either on happy inspiration or on good 
advice, had ceased to trouble himself about his son. He 
had refused to associate himself with the de Ruffey family 
in the steps which they proposed to take to cause the arrest 
of the fugitives, and he had even given up the guardian- 
ship with which he had been entrusted when Mirabeau's 
civil rights had been suspended. The Anecdote again 

68 



MIRABEAU AND SOPHIE DE MONNIER 

aroused his anger. In concert with the Ruffeys he caused 
to be sent to Holland a police officer named des Bruguieres, 
who had failed to catch Mirabeau when he fled from Dijon, 
and wanted his revenge. M. de Vergennes, Minister of 
Foreign Affairs, had asked for the extradition of the 
couple through the Due de Vauguyon, French Minister 
to the United Provinces. Mirabeau had had himself 
made a "burgher" and thought he was safe : in order to 
deliver him up, an order from the States General was 
required. Sophie and he were warned, but they were 
arrested on May 14, the very day on which they meant to 
fly. Four days previously the Lieutenant Criminel of the 
Bailliage of Pontarlier had concluded the case brought by 
M. de Monnier against the guilty lovers. Mirabeau, 
"accused and convicted of the crime of abduction and 
seduction," had been condemned "to be beheaded, the 
sentence to be carried out in effigy by the executioner " ; 
in addition, he was to pay a fine of 5000 livres and 40,000 
livres damages. Mme. de Monnier was found guilty of 
adultery and condemned "to be imprisoned for life in the 
Home of Refuge at Besangon, and there to be shaved and 
branded like a common harlot." These sentences were 
pronounced in contumaciam. 

The. request for their extradition had been granted on 
condition that Mirabeau's debts, amounting to 9050 livres, 
should be paid before he left Amsterdam. His father 
heard of his arrest with a savage roar of joy. " I received 
notice yesterday," he wrote to the Bailli, "that the scoundrel 
is in irons, under lock and key ! " He now had to pay 
the bill, that is to say Mirabeau's debts, and the police 
charges, "a hard matter in these days, when our coffers 
have a girdle of chastity." The French Minister advanced 
the necessary money. Sophie had tried to commit suicide, 
but promised not to do so again on des Bruguieres under- 
taking to help her to correspond with her lover later on. 
The policeman was, in fact, won over by Mirabeau, who 

69 



MIRABEAU 

treated him with great Hberality, and received signal 
services at his hands while in his custody. When the 
couple arrived at Paris they went to des Brugui^res' own 
house, where they parted after a distressing scene. Mira- 
beau had an attack of hemorrhage, while Sophie, conquer- 
ing her weakness, had the strength of mind not to turn her 
head at his cry, " I have made you very unhappy ! " Her 
gentleness, her misfortune and her condition softened the 
heart of Le Noir, the Lieutenant-General of Police, who 
spared her the horrors of Sainte-Pelagie, and sent her 
under the name of Mme. de Courviere to a house of 
correction kept by a Mile. Douay, at first in the Rue de 
Charonne, and afterwards in the Rue de Bellefond. 



70 



CHAPTER V 

MIRABEAU AT VINCENNES 

M. Le Noir and M. Boucher — Correspondence with Sophie — Protests of 
Mirabeau — His occupation — Lettres de cachet — The Comtesse de 
Mirabeau and M. de Marignane — Negotiations leading to Mirabeau's 
release. 

Mirabeau was locked up on June 8, 1777, in a room "ten 
feet square," in the Keep of Vincennes. The Due de 
Beaufort, the Prince de Conde, the Prince de Conti, M. de 
Longueville, and the Cardinal de Retz had been his pre- 
decessors in captivity. He was destined to remain there 
until December 13, 1780. The rules of the prison were 
strict, but their severity was much relaxed in Mirabeau's 
favour. It is true that he was not allowed to leave his cell 
to walk in the garden or the enclosure surrounding the 
castle until the end of 1779, but it was not long before he 
was allowed to have books from outside, and even, under 
certain restrictions, to correspond with Sophie. Two men 
contributed to secure him this mitigation of his punish- 
ment — Le Noir, the lieutenant of police, and his chief 
clerk, Boucher. M. Le Noir had no love for the "econo- 
mists." In 1775, during the Ministry of Turgot, he had 
been relieved of his office for not repressing the bread riots 
with sufficient energy, and he attributed his disgrace to the 
intervention of the Ami des Hommes. When Mirabeau 
wrote to him, " I hate sects and I despise sectaries," he well 
knew what advantages and indulgences he might gain by 
such a profession of faith, which, coming from him, was 
sincere enough, though hardly disinterested. The leniency 
shown to the son by the Lieutenant of Police was his way 

71 



MIRABEAU 

of revenging himself for the severity which he believed 
that he had experienced at the hands of the father. As 
for Boucher, he was ready to follow his chief's example, 
like the docile and prudent clerk that he was, all the more 
because he was a Free Mason like Mirabeau, and, like him 
also, a man of artistic and literary tastes, who was domi- 
nated by the intellectual superiority and attracted by the 
talent and the charm of his fascinating prisoner. Skilfully 
used, these influences triumphed in the end over the more 
strictly correct methods of M. de Rougemont, who, how- 
ever, seems himself to have treated Mirabeau well from 
the first. 

Between the captive of Vincennes and the inmate of 
Mile. Douay's establishment the police agent des Brugu- 
i^res served as intermediary, transmitting news and 
carrying letters from the one to the other. Unfortunately, 
his duties required him to be often absent. In December 
1777 the lovers were authorized to correspond directly, but 
their letters had to be addressed to the Lieutenant of Police, 
and were first examined by him. Having thus been sub- 
mitted to a sort of preliminary censorship, they were read 
by the two lovers, who had to return them to the Police 
Office. 

On January 7, 1778, Sophie gave birth to a daughter, to 
the disappointment of Mirabeau, who in his letters always 
spoke prospectively of his son. This daughter, offspring 
of a double adultery, was registered under the name of 
"Sophie Gabrielle, daughter of Marie Therese Sophie 
Richard de Ruffey, wife of Messire Claude Francois, 
Marquis de Monnier." On June 18 Sophie was transferred 
to the Convent of St. Claire at Gien. Her correspondence 
continued, and after June 1779 was accompanied by a secret 
correspondence, which at a later stage was partly written 
in cipher by means of a cryptographic alphabet specially 
compiled by Mirabeau. 

In 1792 Manuel, Procureur de la Commune de Paris 

72 



MIRABEAU AT VINCENNES 

published the Letters from the Keep of Vincennes, which 
he had found chiefly in the archives of the Bastille. Mira- 
beau's family protested strongly, but in vain, against this 
publication. In 1780 Mirabeau, fearing some similar 
project on the part of Mme. Cabris, with whom he had 
quarrelled and was now on the worst possible terms, wrote 
to Mme. du Saillant : "I am threatened with worse still. 
Some of the monsters who pollute the streets of Paris, while 
so many decent people are groaning in the Bicetre and in 
the galleys, are loudly boasting that they are going to print 
my letters and those of the unhappy victim of my love ! 
This is a terrible blow, and if I survive it shall be to revenge 
myself, should it cost me my life." 

This correspondence, which is celebrated but little 
known, was far from being fit for publication. Its intimate 
character explains, without excusing, the licentious pas- 
sages which are its least worthy title to fame. It was these 
passages which at first aided the success of the book by the 
scandal they caused, and then crushed it with a dead weight 
under which it would succumb were they not (though all 
too numerous) a small and easily negligible fraction of the 
whole. Mirabeau's love for Sophie, for their little girl, his 
advice about education, his grievances against his father, 
his health, his work, his plans, his chances of release, these 
are the most frequent topics. Their repetition is inevit- 
able, but it is also tedious. Mirabeau admits this, for he 
says : " In my situation everything unceasingly brings 
back the same needs and the same ideas." In addition to 
being tedious, his letters were also insincere, as the censor- 
ship to which they were submitted forced him to dissemble 
his sentiments, to attenuate or exaggerate them as the case 
required. He could neither say all he meant nor mean all 
he said. What he wrote was intended as much for his 
patron, whom he had to humour and flatter, as for Sophie 
herself. The correspondence is not, however, without 
interest. To neglect it would be to misunderstand the man 

73 



MIRABEAU 

it depicts, but it does not occupy the position which legend 
persists in assigning to it. 

Mirabeau was an admirer if not a disciple of Rousseau, 
and when he is in love his inspiration is the Nouvelle 
Helo'ise. What he copies, however, is chiefly the defects 
of that work, the declamatory verbiage, the frigidity which 
he exaggerates in his own writings. He has neither spon- 
taneity of passion, nor imagination, nor any real poetic 
feeling. His protestations suggest not a simple, natural, 
nor (it must be confessed) a profound or sincere attachment 
so much as mere sensual delirium exalted and excited by 
solitude and the intoxication which comes of remembrance. 
There is more of his physical temperament than of the 
outpourings of his heart in what he writes. When his 
heart seems to speak it is merely his brain overloaded with 
reminiscences of his reading which guides his pen. Am- 
plification is the leading feature of his method. One 
would think sometimes that he is writing for the sake of 
filling his paper, of making up his pages and of killing 
time. Not only does he repeat himself; he imitates himself 
as he imitates others. He borrows whole passages from 
the memoranda addressed by him to his father or to the 
authorities and throws them into his letters. That was his 
own, and he had a right to take it; but he takes from 
others as well — a copy of verses here, an anecdote there, 
and when he writes to Sophie, "Listen, my dearest, and I 
will pour my heart out into yours," all that he does pour 
is an article from the Mercure de France. 

Fortunately, he can speak in other accents which 
were really his own. When he is addressing ministers 
he expresses himself with a force which makes his 
cause the cause of liberty itself. When he addresses 
the King his tone is even higher: "Sir, I am a French- 
man, young and unhappy; these are all claims to your 
Majesty's interest." He does not beg for mercy ; he claims 
his rights, bringing before the "equity " of the Sovereign 

74 



MIRABEAU AT VINCENNES 

a "denial of justice." He does not deny his errors, but 
"they are not crimes; and, if they were, are they enough 
to justify his condemnation, his imprisonment, and the 
persistent refusal to hear him ? " " If a man had to be irre- 
proachable. Sir, in order to preserve his liberty, it is but 
too true that all your subjects would be in prison." Minis- 
ters are too much occupied with important matters not to 
consider the affairs of private persons trifling and tedious. 
He demands a trial. "Magistrates, who are the deposi- 
taries and the organs of the law, have time to inquire : it 
is their business and their duty. They are your Majesty's 
conscience, if I may be permitted to use such an expres- 
sion, and they have no terrors except for the guilty or the 
calumniator." The peroration is a really fine and dignified 
appeal. "Sir, I implore your clemency because I have 
errors with which to reproach myself; I demand your 
justice because I have committed no crime, and because it 
is terrible to punish the sins of youth as if they were 
atrocious offences. Deign, Sir, to save me from my perse- 
cutors, who have done me too much ill not to hate me, and 
to whom my destruction would be too welcome for them to 
cease to try to bring it about. Cast one kindly glance upon 
a man of twenty-eight, full of zeal and emulation, who is 
buried in a living tomb, with no prospect in the best years 
of his life but lassitude, despair, and perhaps madness." 

It is, however, in a Memoir addressed to his father that 
Mirabeau displays all the qualities of his mind. This 
speech pro domo is a real masterpiece, the vehemence of 
which never sinks into declamation. He is ironical with- 
out insolence, indignant yet affecting, measured yet instant. 
The skill with which he makes the inevitable admissions 
and concessions gives to the whole an air of sincerity which 
is both persuasive and seductive. All the talent of the 
man may be found in this piece. He has spoken of it as 
"a long, tedious production, composed without skill," but 
he did not believe a word of this ; he felt and knew how 

75 



MIRABEAU 

powerful it was. A memoir in which he reviewed all the 
events of his life could not but be long, the essential point 
was to go straight on to the end, and he does so without 
a single repetition, without a stop, without unnecessary 
development or a single useless detail. As for its being 
tedious, nothing could be more alive than this rapid, con- 
centrated, often poignant confession. It was certainly not 
unskilful, but the skill is concealed, or rather it arises not 
from grasp of artificial composition, but from the natural 
spontaneity of the writer. 

Mirabeau commences with striking simplicity: "My 
dear father, it is unworthy of you to take part against me, 
for it is a deep degradation of the paternal dignity to 
descend to the level of your child; but it is not reprehen- 
sible in me to take you as the judge in your own cause, to 
bring before your own tribunal my claims against you." 
Before this tribunal, prejudiced, partial and hostile as it 
was, he narrates all the facts, and comments upon them with 
an eloquence of admirable flexibility, variety and ease. In 
turn he is vehement, grave, witty, light, graceful, indig- 
nant, restrained, exuberant, simple and elaborate. The 
vivacity and passion of his speech is such that it uses every 
tone, every manner, and in all it produces precisely the 
effect intended, and precisely the right effect. When he 
speaks of the prison which has now become the universe 
for him he needs only a single phrase to evoke his situa- 
tion — " What a horrible mutilation of existence ! " he 
cries. "Father, you cannot but have shrunk in horror 
from these silent tortures before you ordered them to be 
applied ! " He finds a striking image to express his sense 
of the youthful errors which have weighed so heavily upon 
his life. "My early years, like reckless prodigals, had 
already in some sense disinherited those that were to come, 
and had dissipated part of my powers." Is it, he asks, by 
way of just punishment for his faults, or for his own 
benefit in order to deliver him from their consequences, or 

76 



MIRABEAU AT VINCENNES 

out of respect for the family honour, that his father persists 
in his inhuman conduct? "If it is justice, may I not sur- 
render myself to the judges ? — I should not be punished 
without being convicted. If you think you are acting for 
my benefit you are mistaken : you rate too highly the love 
which you think I have for life. Perhaps you will say 
that the honour of our house requires that I should be 
saved from the sentence of a court. I reply that as our 
honour concerns others as well as you, you have no right 
to be the sole judge of what it requires ! " Finally, there 
is a cry into which he really puts his whole soul. "I 
cannot endure such a way of life ; I cannot endure it ! Let 
me see the sun, let me breathe a freer air; let me see the 
faces of my kind. ... If you give me the liberty, even a 
restricted liberty, which I ask of you, prison will have 
made me a better man, for time, which passes over my 
head with a much heavier foot than over other men, has 
aroused me from my dreams." 

Meanwhile, he composed poetry — very bad poetry ; he 
sang with taste and feeling ; he drew, read, took notes and 
devoted himself to an all-devouring study of letters, science 
and art. He gave his attention to medicine, developed ideas 
of education which were in advance of his time, and did 
not even give up all hope of turning his military aptitudes 
to account. He criticized contemporary authors with great 
acuteness, placing Rousseau above the rest, but he loved 
La Fontaine, whom he knew by heart and constantly 
quoted, and also the "divine Racine," whose "mighty 
genius, supple imagination and enchanting style" he 
afterwards praised in a panegyric on Britannicus. 

He was a severe critic of himself, and took the view that 
he was "neither above nor below any sort of business." 
He was aware of his gifts, and knew that there was more 
in him than "the crudity of a young man who was long 
about sowing his wild oats." He said to himself that "the 
flame of the passions is often the fire of genius," and he 

77 



MIRABEAU 

did not despair of the future. "The next time I shall be 
dead and buried, but if I may believe my head and my 
heart, and a certain kind of presentiment which is often the 
voice of the soul, my life may not be altogether useless." 

His intellectual energy, which he spent feverishly on all 
sorts of subjects, was astonishing. He composed tales, 
dialogues and tragedies ; he translated Tacitus, Tibullus 
and Boccaccio; he wrote for Sophie a treatise on inocula- 
tion and a grammar ; he studied the Koran and the religion 
of Islam ; he commenced a history of the United Provinces, 
and also, unfortunately, he wrote vile things for which he 
had no other excuse but that he was in need of money for 
books, and even more urgent necessaries. 

In his writing he had collaborators whom he describes 
as "extractors," and whose exact share is difficult to deter- 
mine. His most important work at Vincennes was Lettres 
de Cachet and State Prisons. It was published in 1782, 
and Brissot attributed it to Mirabeau's uncle, the Bailli, as 
did Peltier, who contended that it was impossible for the 
author to have consulted at Vincennes the nine hundred 
authors whom he cites. 

The book was, however, written by Mirabeau, who says 
that before his confinement he had collected materials for 
a great work, of which there was only to be a single chapter. 
The Lettres de Cachet made a great sensation, and had a 
success which was assisted by prosecution and suppres- 
sion. The book is vigorous and incisive, and well sup- 
ported by documents ; but it is not surprising that it has 
lost its freshness. The system of the lettre de cachet 
now seems to us such a monstrous violation of justice and 
individual liberty ; it is so difficult for us nowadays not 
merely to accept the principle, but even to conceive of its 
existence, that to argue against it seems surprisingly 
tedious and superfluous. Mirabeau's discussion of the 
question is abundant and exuberant; there are some lucid 
and vivid chapters ; but the whole work is encumbered and 

78 



MIRABEAU AT VINCENNES 

overloaded with the repetitions which were his besetting 
sin as an author. There is not much philosophy in it ; the 
author makes no attempt to rise to general ideas, and, on 
the other hand, he starts with preconceived ideas and hos- 
tilities which interfere with the freedom of his judgment. 
Louis XI, Richelieu and Louis XIV are particularly ob- 
noxious to the author, who refuses to recognize the special 
achievement or merit of these great men. His hatred for 
religion is an equally serious source of aberration, and 
these prejudiced views are the more discordant as elsewhere 
he shows great insight. An aristocrat by birth and tem- 
perament, he clearly saw how much damage the conferring 
of titles by the Sovereign for a price had done to the mili- 
tary nobility. On the other hand, he expresses his respect 
for the "noblesse de robe," and declares that "never did 
any order in the State do more for the country or cost less 
than the judicature." Judges, he thought, should be irre- 
movable. "The independence of the judges in the ad- 
ministration of justice is as necessary as their freedom, if 
the liberties, the honour, and the lives of our citizens are 
to be safe. Magistrates are to be the organs, not the inter- 
preters, of the law J otherwise they would become mere 
legislators." He is in favour of education, but has a horror 
of "national cowardice." "The chief duty of the wise 
educator," he says, "is to secure for the State forces capable 
of defending its territory, its laws and its freedom. Every 
political system which does not maintain a thoroughly 
sound military establishment, or rather which does not 
inspire the people with the military spirit so necessary to 
its preservation (a spirit, I may observe in passing, which 
is diametrically opposed to the madness of militarism), 
every political system, I say, which lacks this essential is 
defective." Anticipating the States General, he declares 
that "the law, in order to be just, legitimate and obligatory 
— in order, in fact, to be truly the law, must be sealed by 
the free and universal consent of the people." He adds 

79 



MIRABEAU 

that "in every state in which the citizens do not participate 
in the power of legislation by delegation of a body of repre- 
sentatives freely elected by the majority of the people, 
wisely restricted by their instructions, especially as to the 
nature and the collection of taxes, and subject to the control 
of their constituents, there neither is nor can be any public 
liberty." 

These passages, with their power and precision, reveal 
the statesman, and show how when his hour came he was 
ready to play a part in the Revolution, which was the 
realization of his principles. I should, however, be unjust 
to the author if I did not say that there are also in his 
book picturesque and vivid pages, especially about Amster- 
dam and about London. The following description of 
Paris, too, is less out of date than might be supposed. 
"You have indeed reason to be proud of your police, O 
Parisians ! You are polluted by the filth of your people 
and your streets : your houses are so high that they shut 
out the air. . . . Your wine merchants poison you. 
Everywhere your health and your purses are assailed by 
a multiplicity of the most dangerous temptations. Every 
day in your absurdly constructed theatres you brave in- 
salubrity and contagion. . . . O Parisians, admire your 
sublime police ! " It is difficult to believe that this was 
written in 1778. 

Between two pamphlets or between two letters to Sophie, 
Mirabeau, ill fed, ill clothed and unwell, racked with violent 
pains in his back and troubled with enfeebled eyesight, 
multiplied his appeals to M. Le Noir, to the Due de 
Noailles, to M. Amelot, the Secretary of State, and to the 
Comte de Maurepas to be set free, or at least to be brought 
to trial. His father sent some one to visit him once, and 
only once, and remained inflexible. His cruelty, which 
nothing could disarm, found expression in savage terms. 
"I shall do my best," he said, "to seal up this madman 
as bees seal up a snail which has found its way into their 

80 



MIRABEAU AT VINCENNES 

hive." An unforeseen accident unexpectedly secured what 
the most passionate prayers had failed to accomplish. 
Mirabeau's son died suddenly on October 8, 1778, on the 
very day on which he completed his fifth year. Mirabeau 
had seen very little of him, and though not without 
paternal affection, was, on his own confession, more 
interested in his adulterous offspring. The misfortune 
gave the Comtesse de Mirabeau a terrible shock, which 
seemed for a moment to tear her away from the futilities 
and frivolous amusements to which she devoted her life. 
The Marquis was quite prostrated. "I could not but ask 
Heaven," he wrote, "with more tears than I have shed 
in all my Hfe, to deign to inform my conscience what are 
the crimes by which I have deserved such an unexampled 
accumulation of sorrows." Mme. du Saillant, fearing to 
"reopen so recent a wound," sent her condolences, not 
to her sister-in-law, but to the Marquis de Marignane. 
Mme. de Pailly added a postscript to the following effect : 
"May Mme. de Pailly be permitted to add, M. le Marquis, 
that she mingles her tears with those which are being 
shed here at the loss which you have suffered. She will 
not attempt to express to your daughter the deep sympathy 
she feels on this melancholy occasion, but she trusts that 
neither she nor you will doubt the interest she takes in 
all that concerns you, or her prayers for your health." 
(October 20, 1778.) 

On the advice of her father, and perhaps as the result 
of this letter, Mme. de Mirabeau decided to leave for Le 
Bignon. Suddenly, however, either because she was 
afraid of falling ill there, or because she doubted her 
welcome, she changed her mind. The Marquis was an- 
noyed, and on November 13 he wrote asking her to come. 
"My dear daughter, as you wish to come to me and your 
father makes no objection, I insist on your keeping your 
word. Your old father has need of you. You know my 
heart ; it is old enough and uniform enough in its working, 

G 81 



MIRABEAU 

it has no secret chamber. ... I am doing my best, my 
child, I need all my courage to live, to exist. A long, a 
very long series of overwhelming and almost daily misfor- 
tunes, my work and my reflections, have taught me to 
conquer even my most natural and innocent sentiments. 
My example will perhaps teach you how with a dagger in 
one's heart one can and ought to conceal a hopeless wound 
in the presence of others, how one may appear calm and 
interested in them and theirs, and in the things of every- 
day life, how one may even be cheerful. This way of life 
is possible, and one even finds in it some relief for our 
poor bodies, one learns to work a great deal and think 
little, and to appear and to be the same just because one 
is not oneself." 

In spite of a further and pressing invitation dated 
December 30, 1778, Mme. de Mirabeau did not come. 
Perhaps a passage in the former letter, which was in- 
tended to reassure her, had had the contrary effect. "If 
any one were mean enough," the Marquis had said, "to 
think or say that I want you to come in order to entrap 
you into a reconciliation, you surely are not the sort of 
woman to believe it." Doubtless the Marquis was above 
setting traps, but if it was too early to attempt a recon- 
ciliation, it was clear that if there was to be a reconciliation 
at all, it could not be postponed too long after the death 
of his grandchild. The Marquis was obsessed with the 
idea of founding a great family, and had already "laid 
his plans for a great marriage with a child not yet two 
years old." This project was dead and buried, but, to 
use the Bailli's picturesque expression, the Marquis's 
"posteromania " persisted, and it contributed to Mirabeau's 
release. 

Dupont (afterwards De Nemours), a friend of the 
Marquis and a collaborator of Turgot, was working in that 
direction with the assent of the Ami des Hommes, who 
stood aside in order to watch and guide the negotiations, 

82 



MIRABEAU AT VINCENNES 

intending at the proper moment to emerge and impose 
what conditions he thought fit. The discussion was pro- 
longed. In May 1779 Dupont persuaded Mirabeau to 
write a letter to his father, asking to be forgiven for his 
faults, and assuring him of the sincerity of his confessions 
and his good resolutions. If this step cost Mirabeau very 
little, "for the recollection of a father is always affecting," 
it was very different with the overtures which, according 
to Dupont's plan, he had to make to his wife. Neverthe- 
less, he made up his mind to this course. After having 
obtained the consent and approbation of Sophie, who in 
all this business showed the most admirable self-abnega- 
tion, he gave the Countess to understand that his fate 
depended upon her, that assuredly his father would not 
refuse to listen to her, and that he was not incapable of 
showing gratitude to her for what she might do for him. 
Six weeks later he received a letter from his wife, who 
reminded him that he had insulted her in one of his 
memoirs, and contented herself with expressing her good 
wishes for his happiness without taking any steps to 
further it. An appeal addressed by Mirabeau to his father- 
in-law, M. de Marignane, drew a brutal reply in which 
there was an implied threat of a suit for separation. 
Without their co-operation there was nothing to be done, 
for the Marquis de Mirabeau was acting only in the hope 
of a reconciliation of the spouses, which might result in 
his having another grandson, and refused to take any step 
unless asked to do so by his daughter-in-law. 

Convinced of the necessity of making a further suppli- 
cation, Mirabeau in April 1780 made up his mind to a 
final effort. The two letters which he wrote to his wife 
and to his father-in-law have not hitherto been published. 
I will quote the essential parts. His health serves as the 
pretext. To his wife he writes : "My health is very bad. 
I am excessively tormented with kidney trouble, to which 
you know I am subject ; I am attacked with gravel, threat- 

83 



MIRABEAU 

ened with stone; my eyes are going. I shall never get 
better here. The Governor of the Chateau, as is admitted 
by the Minister and the judge, has seen my father, and 
informed him of my condition. My father replied that 
my liberty (and therefore my life) depended entirely on 
you. He would refuse you nothing you chose to ask, but 
he would not take on himself to do anything which you 
might not desire. I am therefore entirely at your mercy, 
and at that of your father; and I am glad that it is so, 
for you are not wanting in humanity, in sensibility, in 
nobility. I am writing to him, and he will tell you all that 
I now ask you to do. If you would do more I should be 
deeply touched, but I should not take it ill if you and he 
think fit to let me earn and deserve whatever further con- 
sideration you may hereafter show me. In any case I 
shall feel bound, by gratitude for the service you may do 
me, to do my best to please you in all things. You have 
known my heart, but only when it was much less mature 
than it now is as the result of so many years of misfortune 
and suffering. You have seen how sensible I always am 
of benefits conferred, and I say with the utmost sincerity 
that what I have learned of your disposition would make 
it most gratifying to me if one more bond could be added 
to those which unite or ought to unite us." 

To understand the depth of the humiliation which 
Mirabeau must have felt in writing this letter, we must 
remember that by the publication of one single letter he 
could have dishonoured the woman whose nobility he 
vaunted, and whom since his imprisonment at Vincennes 
he had not ceased to cover with abuse and insults. It was 
not merely her intervention that he solicited. We have 
only to read between the lines of his letter to see that 
from this time forward he allowed it to be seen that he 
hoped to be re-united to her. Truly the Marquis had 
reason to be satisfied. His son's submission would not 
deceive either his desires or his hopes. 

84 



MIRABEAU AT VINCENNES 

In writing to M. de Marignane, Mirabeau could not for- 
get the "severe reprimand" which had been the reply to 
his first petition, and which was not wholly deserved. 
"In so far as I have been the victim of circumstances 
beyond my control, or of the over-violent passions of 
youth, I can only confess that I have been wrong and 
ask your pardon, with a keen desire to make amends so 
far as it is possible for me to do so, and to devote to the 
expiation of my faults the same energy of will which has 
brought me into my present situation. I could not believe, 
I cannot yet believe, that two families as noble in their 
principles as in their birth will conspire to condemn to 
death, both civilly and physically, a man so nearly con- 
nected with them, who has no doubt done wrong, but 
who cries aloud to both, ' I wish to reform my ways : put 
me in a position to do so.' Clemency is the greatest privi- 
lege of the generous. For those who have come to require 
it, it is perhaps the hardest to ask. But I am past con- 
sidering what is agreeable or what is unpleasant to me. 
I consider only what I believe to be my duty, and it is 
certainly my duty to manifest to you my repentance for 
the real injuries I have done you, and by imploring your 
assistance to show you how great is my esteem and respect. 
To ask pardon of a man is to treat him as if he were God 
Himself. God never refuses pardon to those who ask it, 
and has He not enjoined men to grant it also even unto 
seventy times seven ? I do not ask for complete forgive- 
ness, sir, I wish for no gratuitous favours; I only ask to 
be put in a position to earn and merit them. I ask you 
to deliver me from death, and to give me the means of 
leading an honourable and virtuous life, and until I have 
used the first of your favours to repair my past, I do not 
expect you to grant me the rest. . . . The two families to 
which I belong, my two fathers, have been angered 
against me, but in spite of that I know them too well to 
believe that they are prepared to condemn me in cold 

85 



MIRABEAU 

blood to a cruel and painful death. I know them too well 
not to flatter myself that they would be glad of my deliver- 
ance if they would be sure that it would not expose them 
to further injuries from me. I therefore venture to ask 
them to deliver my body and make trial of my mind. 
... I am not asking for complete liberty, but for the 
chance of earning it. I had thought in an interval of my 
sufferings that I might earn it in the wars, but my infirmi- 
ties are too serious to admit of this. I would therefore ask 
you of your humanity to allow me to settle, under the 
double bond of a Royal order and of my word of honour, 
in a village near Paris, where I can be within reach 
of medical assistance, and can take some exercise, especi- 
ally on horseback, which is regarded as the sole remedy 
(if indeed there is a remedy) for my complaints. I should 
remain there until cured, and I should try while there so 
to conduct myself that you would thereafter think it well 
to relieve me of the last of my bonds. Believe, sir, you 
are generous enough to believe, that I shall be much more 
firmly attached to my two families and to my duty, and 
much better restrained from further follies, by such a chain 
of benefits than by the drawbridges, the mighty walls and 
the iron gates of the fortress in which I live. L hope to 
receive an answer from you. I am asking you for my 
life, which I hope to lead in accordance with your wishes." 
The firmness, the dignity and the emotion which are 
concentrated in this letter would be touching enough if 
its sincerity were beyond suspicion. Unfortunately it is 
only too certain that Mirabeau was playing a part, and 
that he was doing his best to play it well in order that 
the happy ending might come the faster. As the Bailli 
wrote to him, "if his talent for persuasion were less he 
would persuade more easily." Although compared to the 
Almighty in person, M. de Marignane refused to commit 
himself to any step, and contented himself with forward- 
ing his son-in-law's letter to the Marquis de Mirabeau, 

86 



MIRABEAU AT VINCENNES 

and with expressing the hope that the Marquis "might 
have sufficient confidence in his son to venture on the 
experiment." 

Once more Mirabeau turned to his wife, who at last 
decided upon an intervention, which, owing to the death of 
the child born to her husband and Sophie, it was now easier 
to turn to account. This bereavement drew a poignant cry 
from Sophie. Mirabeau tried to console her terrible grief 
by the hope that they might have more children. "Oh 
how I wish that this might be so' ! " she wrote. "But who 
knows whether we shall again have this happiness? 
And if we had, could they repair this loss ? She had 
cost us so much ! The others could only be born in 
happier days ! " 

The same impression prevailed with those about Sophie 
at Gien, with those in contact with Mirabeau at Vincennes 
and even at Pontarlier, whence Mme. de Ruffey did not 
cease to send firm letters of good advice to her daughter, 
namely, that the death of Sophie's child must make it 
easier to regularize the position of the two prisoners. It 
did, in fact, help to precipitate the decision of the Marquis, 
who did not yet wish to appear in person, and therefore 
procured the intervention of Mme. du Saillant, whose 
letters he was careful to "lard with some good and mature 
reflections." This new negotiation, in which Mme. de 
Pailly and the Bailli participated, lasted some months 
longer. Fundamentally, what the Marquis wanted from 
his son was, On the one hand, that he should use his 
influence with his mother to arrange the family affairs for 
the best (Mirabeau had already tried this in the previous 
year), and on the other that he should lend himself to a 
complete reconciliation with his wife in order that there 
might be more children. Mirabeau was too anxious for 
his liberty and too much in need of it not to accept 
everything. 

At the height of these negotiations he yielded to his 

87 



MIRABEAU 

irresistible passion for intrigue by conducting a strange 
and mysterious correspondence with a young woman, a 
certain Mile. Julie Dauvers, mistress of M. de La Page, 
Secretary to Baudouin de Guemadeuc, a former Maitre 
des Requetes, who had been sent to Vincennes owing to 
misconduct. Mirabeau did not know Julie and had never 
seen her, but the strangeness of the affair only attracted 
him the more. He wrote to her and to her lover a series 
of agreeable, cufious and amusing letters, in which, in 
order to maintain their interest and to secure their con- 
fidence, he boasted of his influence at Court, which he 
alleged was due to his relations (in the widest sense of the 
term) with the Princesse de Lamballe ! In this odious 
pretence there is a delight in lying for its own sake, and a 
shameless cynicism which are positively revolting. It may 
be added that these letters, which have been published by 
M. Dauphin Meunier, who has added a vivacious and 
ingenious commentary, are full of verve and wit. We 
have in them a new Mirabeau, less emphatic and senten- 
tious than Sophie's correspondent. If, as I incline to 
think, it is impossible to know Mirabeau completely, these 
letters help us at least to know a little more about him. 

At the desire of the Marquis de Mirabeau, whose request 
was seconded by the prisoner of Vincennes, a lettre de 
cachet in a hitherto unprecedented form was granted, 
which enjoined the Count "to retire to the place on which 
his father should decide." Thus the Ami des Hommes 
remained the master of the discipline to which he chose 
to submit his son, who henceforth was called simply "M. 
Honore." 



88 



CHAPTER VI 

THE LAWSUITS AT PONTARLIER AND AT AIX 

Mitabeau and his father : his stay at Le Bignon — Attempts at a recon- 
ciliation with the Comtesse de Mirabeau— The Pontariier affair — 
Discussions and arrangements — Rupture with Sophie — The lawsuit 
at Aix — Mirabeau as a forensic orator — A masterpiece. 

Mirabeau left the keep on December 13, 1780, "naked 
as the day he was born." His brother-in-law, the Marquis 
du Saillant, went to Vincennes to meet him, and after 
spending a few days in the chateau with the surgeon-major, 
he took up his abode in Paris with Boucher, the employe 
of the secret police, whose kindness had ameliorated his 
lot in prison and whom he called "his good angel." He 
kept his word, and carried out the mission entrusted to 
him by his father, but he failed to persuade his mother, 
with whom he quarrelled and against whom he wrote a 
memoir — a sad counterpart of those he had formerly com- 
posed for her against his father ! The Marquis, moreover, 
lost his case ; the Grand Chambre du Parlement de Paris 
on May 15, 1781, pronounced a decree of separation in 
person and goods in favour of the Marquise. Mme. du 
Saillant communicated the news to the Comtesse de Mira- 
beau in the following terms : " I know too well your 
attachment to my unfortunate father, and all our family, 
not to feel sure of your keen sympathy in the misfor- 
tune which has just overtaken him. He has just lost 
his case against my mother, and the same judges who 
pronounced in his favour three years ago have now turned 
against him and have given a most extraordinary and 
unjust decision." At the same time she invited her sister- 

89 



MIRABEAU 

in-law and "the good uncle" to Le Bignon to sustain the 
spirits of the old Marquis. These attentions had some- 
thing to do with the plans of reconciliation which the latter 
had not abandoned. Mirabeau had associated himself 
with these by writing to his wife a curious note, hitherto 
unpublished, on the occasion of the commencement of the 
year 1781 : "I begin this year, madame, under less un- 
favourable auspices than most of those which have 
preceded it. My bonds are broken, and by your hand. 
I beg you to believe, however, that I am not happy, and 
that there is only one form of happiness which would so 
far complete the others that they would merit the name. 
That is to deserve if possible that you should give me back 
all the rights which I formerly had to your affection. May 
this happy moment come some day. Till then, I shall have 
patience and shall console myself by prayers, very tender 
prayers, for your happiness which I shall not share. — 
Honore." 

The judicial misfortune suffered by the Marquis, the con- 
sequences of which for his fortune were serious, decided 
him to receive his son whom he had not seen for nearly 
nine years. He extended his hand to his son as to a friend, 
and observed that he had long since forgiven the enemy, 
and hoped one day to be able to bless the son. He wrote 
the Bailli a letter in which he described his impression of 
this interview : " I thought him much stouter, especially 
about the shoulders, the head and the neck. Apart from 
his restlessness, he has the family make and shape and 
gait. His hair is very fine, his forehead and eyes frank. 
There is much less affectation in his speech than there used 
to be, but there is still some; for the rest his manner is 
natural enough, and he is much less red in the face. . . ." 

A week later Mirabeau suddenly disappeared. Some 
months previously, when his release seemed imminent, 
he had planned a visit to Sophie at the Convent of Gien. 
The moment for this foolhardy enterprise was ill-chosen. 

90 



THE LAWSUITS AT PONTARLIER 

Julie Dauvers had presented a petition to the Tribunal 
of the Marshals of France, which threatened to lead to his 
arrest and he decided to go. It was a mad and romantic 
escapade, but it was well managed and swiftly carried out, 
and it succeeded. Mirabeau gained admission to the con- 
vent on May 29, stayed with Sophie for five days and left 
again on June 2. His journey was intended to prepare 
Sophie for the breaking off of their relations. Since his 
liberation the rarity and the brevity of his letters, for 
which his excuses were always inadequate, hiad given 
the unfortunate lady a presentiment that this would be 
so. She sacrificed herself, giving her inconstant and 
frivolous lover this supreme proof of her affection. In the 
last month of his sojourn at Vincennes, Mirabeau had not 
contented himself with his audacious if platonic corre- 
spondence with Julie ; he had had several more realistic 
affairs. While he was with Boucher he had several more, 
not counting one with the mistress of the house, a pretty 
rather unbalanced woman with artistic leanings, who did 
not refuse him what she had granted to so many others. 
In these matters he was incorrigible, without self-restraint, 
decency or delicacy, an accomplished seducer with a gift 
for lying which few women could resist. "Repulsively 
ugl}^ as he is," observed the Marquis, "he excels in a 
pursuit in which the surest weapons are impudence and 
audacity." 

His father took him to Le Bignon and kept him under 
observation. To stifle the scandal of the "billet d'hon- 
neur " for 500 livres, brought by Julie Dauvers before the 
Court of Marshals, he had sacrificed his gold snuff-box, 
the only article of value he possessed. He saw and he 
described his son's defects of character, his ingrained 
disorder, his taste for exaggeration, his effrontery, his 
charlatanry, his exuberance and his hypocrisy. In spite 
of his son's wildness, however, he felt that he was a 
good fellow, easy to live with, incapable of intentional 

91 



MIRABEAU 

unkindness. "Despite his horrid ugHness," he wrote, 
"his halting gait, his breathless, turgid impetuosity and 
his outrageous conceit, something tells me that when 
he chooses to listen and to think he is more than a man 
of straw." Above all, though he regarded his son's 
knowledge as superficial and not altogether wrongly de- 
scribed him as "by instinct a pie and a jay," he was 
amazed at the breadth, the strength and the suppleness of 
his mind. At the time when Mirabeau was negotiating 
with his mother on his behalf, and when he could only 
judge of his son by his writings, the Marquis had already 
detected the eagle eye. Now that he saw him at close 
quarters, and knew him better, he found that he was 
practical and resourceful, that he had a great deal of 
talent, a strong will, a great power of working ardently 
and easily, and in fact that "he had a future before him." 
This being so, the Marquis was constantly thinking how 
he could bring him and his wife together, how to bring 
him back to her, and how to "persuade her to come to the 
hook again." Some weeks before he lost his case, he wrote 
to the Comtesse to thank her for a consignment of oil. 
His letter was jocular in tone, but he allowed his daughter- 
in-law to see that he was obstinately attached to his 
favourite project. He jested about the mania for writing 
which characterized his family, contrasting it with the 
laziness of the Comtesse. "If my race were perpetuated 
by you as (with respect be it said) seemed to be your 
destiny, I think that the infusion of Marignane blood 
would be the best means of reducing, or even eradicating, 
this malady." He wished that his ancestors might have 
successors while those who surrounded his daughter-in- 
law were interested in keeping her childless, and he put 
forward his candidate boldly. " If any one ever takes upon 
himself to propose that you should have descendants, and 
that you should take the received means of procuring 
them , may good St. Yves keep him from being as 

92 



THE LAWSUITS AT PONTARLIER 

awkward in his solicitation as I should be. I know that 
henceforth I have no madman to present to you. I have 
not seen him, but I am following him very closely. He has 
been exposed to all sorts of trials, and has kept his self- 
control. I have myself tried him severely and I have 
found nothing but docility and obedience. As to his 
exterior, he is become a reserved, good-looking, even 
imposing figure, and has lost his agitated, discordant 
movements. All who have seen him, and they are many, 
are much pleased, for he has lived in the midst of snares 
of all kinds, reaping everywhere what he has sown and 
not ignorant of the depth of the abyss which he has 
escaped." (March 22, 1781.) 

Some months later, Mirabeau himself made similar 
overtures to his wife. After excusing his silence on the 
ground of the "chaos of his affairs and the matters into 
which he had so suddenly been thrown, and by which he 
had been swept away," he added, "God forbid that this 
silence should be eternal. It is impossible that we should 
be strangers to each other. You were the mother of my 
son; you are my wife. And now that I see you with ex- 
perienced eyes from which the scales have fallen, I hasten 
to add that I would not change even if I could. Our 
interests, if they have ceased to be identical, can never be 
contrary, and I shall not lightly renounce the hope of 
again finding in you a friend and a spouse and of being 
happy in the happiness I shall give and receive. My plans, 
my way of life, and my re-establishment in my family, are 
at last settled. I have gained that honour and happiness 
which promise so much and which perhaps I had no right 
to expect; my passions are quite calmed, and my heart is 
expanding in the bosom of a family from whom I have 
been estranged too long. I have regained that gentle way 
of life of which my errors and my misfortunes seemed to 
have deprived me for ever, and I owe it to you that I 
should tell you of my well-being and express my gratitude 

93 



MIRABEAU 

to you who have contributed so much to it. It is for 
those who see me every day, who have me under their 
observation, who support and guide me and often speak 
to me of you — it is for them to say whether they think me 
less fit for that serene and peaceful existence than for the 
agitated existence to which the scourge of the Furies 
seemed to have doomed me. I feel and I confess that you 
have every right to prolong your attitude of caution. I 
am not unaware of all that evil tongues have said, and will 
continue to say of me. I have given them too much 
cause not to be resigned to that. But you are too just to 
believe lightly any but my natural judges and witnesses, 
who are assuredly incapable of deceiving you from any 
interested motive whatever." (Unpublished letter of 
August 22, 1 781.) 

It is impossible not to appreciate the force, the firmness, 
the artistic ingenuity and eloquence of this fine letter. 
The Comtesse deMirabeau, however, could not allow herself 
to be deceived by her husband's professions, and doubtless 
she sent no reply. To the Bailli, who pressed her to relent, 
she declared that if her husband wished her to forget the 
past he should join the Insiirgents and distinguish himself 
by some gallant action. Meanwhile she had made her 
re-entry into society ; and was dancing, singing and acting 
for the delectation of the gay company of which she was 
an ornament. 

It was now high time for Mirabeau to be thinking how 
he could avert the consequences of the sentence passed on 
him at Pontarlier if he was not to be overtaken by the 
completion of the period of five years, after which his 
condemnation to pay M. de Monnier 40,000 livres would 
become final. This period expired in May 1782, and it 
was all the more important for him to "get his head 
replaced on his shoulders," as the suspension or depriva- 
tion of his civil rights might be a weapon in the hands of 
M. de Marignane, who had threatened him with a suit for 

94 



THE LAWSUITS AT PONTARLIER 

separation from his wife. For several months Mirabeau 
had been studying with his lawyer the procedure for 
obtaining the cancellation of the sentence. The Ruffey 
family had fully empowered the Marquis to act for them. 

Fortified by his father's instructions, and accompanied 
by des Birons, the husband of one of his mistresses whom 
he had transformed into a man of law, and by Legrain, a 
valet who was to serve him for the rest of his life, Mirabeau 
left for Pontarlier on February 2, 1782. After a short 
stay at Dijon, where des Birons obtained from Mme. de 
Ruffey a promise not to do anything to prevent a settle- 
ment, the party duly reached Pontarlier. An attempt to 
deal with M. de Monnier and his daughter Mme. de 
Valhadon, with whom he was now reconciled, in a haughty 
and almost threatening tone miscarried. 

On February 12, Mirabeau surrendered as a "voluntary 
prisoner," and the case commenced. A series of questions 
was put to him, and with arrogant irony he denied every- 
thing, abduction, seduction ("whicfi cannot be") and 
adultery ("which neither has nor can be proved"). He 
contradicted the witnesses, contested their impartiality, 
and (as regarded those who came from Switzerland) their 
right to be heard by a French court. Instead of obeying his 
father's counsels of moderation, he published passionate, 
eloquent and imprudent memoirs, in which he denounced 
"the partiality, the obscure connivance, the secret sub- 
ornation, the vexatiousness in detail" which characterized 
the proceedings. He attacked successively Mme. de Val- 
hadon, M. de Saint-Mauris, the witnesses, the judge, and 
the magistrate Sombarde, who, though a relation of M'. de 
Monnier, had nevertheless figured in the case. His object 
was "to expose crimes and calumnies," to arouse public 
opinion in his favour, and toi appeal to public opinion 
against judicial intrigues and decisions. The Council 
of Neuchatel forbade the Swiss witnesses to testify as toi 
the facts seen or known by them in their own country. 

95 



MIRABEAU 

This was a success. On the other hand, the Parlement of 
Besan9on on appeal refused his provisional release, which 
was a defeat and an evil omen. 

Amid all these incidents no settlement was reached 
after three months of litigation. The Marquis was irritated 
at his son's attitude and anxious about the development 
of proceedings which threatened to ruin all his plans. 
He therefore sent du Saillant, a prudent person, to follow 
the case, not allowing himself to be led away by Mirabeau's 
"senseless ideas." Mirabeau was obstinate : he rejected any 
settlement unless the previous proceedings were quashed. 
He protested that no one had a right before God or man 
to interfere with his case against his will, without his 
knowledge or consent. At last, however, he gave way. An 
agreement was signed before two notaries at Besan^on and 
was ratified on August 14 by the Bailli de Pontarlier. 
M. de Monnier agreed to consider void and of none effect 
the sentence pronounced against Mirabeau in contumaciam 
and to renounce all its results. His wife, sentenced to 
confinement in a convent till the end of the first year after 
her husband's death, was separated from him in person 
and estate. She was to receive back her dowry, and after 
M. de Monnier's death was to have an annual allowance 
for life of 1200 livres. It was strange enough that a civil 
agreement should be capable of annulling the consequences 
of a criminal prosecution : it was still more curious that in 
case the conditions were not carried out M. de Monnier or 
his heirs had the right to re-open the whole case ! 

They had no occasion. Sophie submitted with resigna- 
tion to a sentence which separated her for ever from 
Mirabeau. Some months after her husband's death she 
removed to a small house near the convent. With her 
natural gentleness and generosity, she engaged in works 
of charity, to which she devoted most of her resources, and 
she was on the point of marrying an ex-captain of cavalry, 
who had no doubt been her lover, when he died suddenly. 

96 



THE LAWSUITS AT PONTARLIER 

On the very next day, September g, 1789, Sophie committed 
suicide — a hapless victim of love. As she lighted the 
fatal brazier of charcoal she may have thought of the seal 
which Mirabeau had sent her twelve years before, on which 
was cut the brief and bold device, A te principium, tibi 
desinet. It was twice false; he had loved before he met 
her, and she was not the last of his loves. 

After the settlement at Pontarlier, Mirabeau felt himself 
at a loss. He realized, it is true, that on the whole it was 
better than the prolongation of a scandalous case with all 
its distressing' publicity. But his "turbulent disquiet" 
found nothing on which to work. What was he to do? 
How was he to employ his strength ? Where was he to 
go? He felt that "he was under the censure of his father, 
forsaken, perhaps hated by his mother, suspected by his 
uncle, watched by his creditors, threatened by his wife, 
denuded of everything, position, money and credit." He 
did not exaggerate. Everywhere his errors and the 
memory of his misconduct rose up against him. He was 
trusted by no one. What he wanted, he cried, was a 
swordthrust. He spoke of abandoning his name and his 
country, but his father, whose dislike of him was not 
without penetration, was not deceived by the gusty 
caprices which passed through his mind, and he summed 
up his son's case in one of his shrewd remarks when he 
said of him, "he plays at passion and is at the same time 
its slave." 

The mood passed, and, on reflection, Mirabeau decided 
to go to Neuchatel to settle accounts with his publishers 
and to propose further business. This journey brought 
him into touch with Clavi^re and Duroveray, two democrats 
exiled from, Geneva, from whom he learned much and who 
were afterwards to be of considerable use to him. Having 
been informed by them of the situation at Geneva he sent 
to M. de Vergennes, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, a very 
sagacious memorandum on the subject, the object and 
H 97 



MIRABEAU 

spirit of which is shown by the following phrase: "The 
law of the stronger is the law of nations wihich we cannot 
hope will be respected except by the weakest among them." 

His father now urged him to gO' to Provence to settle 
matters with his wife, and accordingly he arrived at Mira- 
beau on October i. The Bailli, weary of his "insupportable 
arrogance," had made up his mind to show him no 
cordiality, and in fact the welcomiC he received was by no 
means warm. This coldness, however, did not last long, 
for the nephew soon found means to regain the confidence 
and affection of his uncle. The country people had 
received Mirabeau with feux de joie and every manifesta- 
tion of delight. He was adored in this neighbourhood, and 
when his hour came this popularity was to be the main 
force behind his talents. At this point in his life his 
talents had not yet stirred the public, and he relied more on 
his all-conquering charm, which must never be forgotten 
by any one who wishes to understand Mirabeau or the 
secret of his success. 

The Marquis wanted a settlement, not a lawsuit, and 
to secure a settlement he trusted to his son's abilities. He 
feared the violence and the scandal of a case in court, and 
he feared also a danger which it was only too easy to foresee. 
He had written too much ! On the eve of his son's release, 
when his daughter-in-law and M. de Marignane gave their 
consent to Mirabeau's deliverance from Vincennes, the 
Marquis had given the following undertaking : " I give 
you my word of honour that my son will not, with 
my approval, approach your daughter unless by your 
orders or permission. Having reached my sixty-sixth year 
without deceiving anybody I shall not begin a career of 
perjury at my age." He was bound by this paper, which 
prevented him as a man of honour from lending himself 
to the commencement of proceedings for restitution of 
conjugal rights, or in any way to being a party to opposi- 
tion to M. de Marignane's decision to keep the spouses 

98 



THE LAWSUITS AT PONTARLIER 

apart. The risk of being taken for a perjurer was not the 
only one he incurred, for he had furnished his adversaries 
with other weapons. "The fiend of scribomania," as the 
BailH put it, had prompted him to write horrible letters in 
which he referred to his son as "an accomplished villain who 
should be erased from the memory of mankind," and had 
accused him, without proof, of the most perfidious and even 
criminal designs. These letters he 'had written to the 
Comtesse de Mirabeau and to M. de Marignane. They 
were no doubt confidential, but the temptation to make use 
of them was too great to be resisted. 

The Count commenced operations immediately after his 
arrival at the Chateau de Mirabeau. Freedom had restored 
his audacity, and he behaved no longer like a captive 
imploring a favour, but as a husband claiming his rights. 
He wanted his wife, and addressed his demands to herself ; 
she resisted, and gave the Bailli to understand that as a 
dutiful and obedient daughter, her duty was to stay with 
her father, and that on no consideration whatever would 
she live with M. de Mirabeau. Her husband insisted and 
appealed to his right to "his most precious possession, the 
only one which henceforth could adorn his life." The 
Marquis de Marignane replied that the courts would pro- 
nounce on his rights to that possession. The Bailli 
intervened. He had been a party to the undertaking 
entered into by his brother ; nevertheless, honest man 
though he was, he stooped to a casuistical explanation of 
this document. But neither his entreaties nor his visits 
nor the innumerable letters which Mirabeau wrote in 
varying tones, nor plans for conference, nor even an 
attempt the husband made to see his wife, had the slightest 
effect. Months passed and Mirabeau had only the alterna- 
tives of raising the siege or taking the position by storm. 
He chose the latter course. On February 28, he formally 
summoned his wife to return to the domestic hearth. She 
retorted by a demand for a separation. And thus com- 

99 



MIRABEAU 

menced a case, the incidents and the consequences of which 
were destined to make it one of the most famous in judicial 
history. 

At the outset of the proceedings the parties were 
unequally matched. Everything was on the side of the 
wife. She was the adored queen of a brilliant society. 
She had money, power, and influence, and the inestimable 
advantage of a family connection with the judicature. Not 
content with securing for her side the biting eloquence 
of a young advocate named Portalis, whose already 
established reputation had been enhanced by a recent 
cause celebre, she was clever enough to approach all the 
other eminent counsel and prevent them from taking part 
in the case. Her adversary was head over ears in debt, a 
man who had been twice condemned, who was more 
celebrated for his transgressions than for his achievements, 
for his imprisonment than for his talent, a rebellious son, 
a notoriously and insolently unfaithful husband, a 
debauchee to whom all doors were closed. He had neither 
resources, nor authority, nor credit ; he was on bad terms 
with the Government, which he had attacked, and he 
appeared to be at her mercy. 

Everything indeed was apparently against him. But 
he was a man capable of brushing everything aside. 
Nothing daunted him, and in the struggle which he knew 
to be decisive he had in his favour incomparable gifts 
lavished on him by nature, a powerful and lucid intellect, 
an eagle eye, a supple and ingenious wit, a strong and 
striking voice, and an eloquence of which it can only be 
said that it was all that eloquence can be. Hitherto he had 
been merely a writer; he had no experience of speaking. 
But he knew himself; he had taken his own measure and 
he felt what he was to become. At Pontarlier he had been 
deeply moved by the peroration of one of his memoirs. 
"If this," he wrote, "is not eloquence of a kind unknown 
to this age of slavery, then I do not know what that 

100 



THE LAWSUITS AT PONTARLIER 

precious and attractive gift may be." But in fact he did 
not yet know his own power. Eloquence must face the 
test of an audience, of debate and interruption, of the 
atmosphere of a pubhc contest. The opportunity came, 
he seized it; he lost his case, but he proved that he was 
an orator beyond compare. 

The case, however, was not lost at once. The tribunal 
was composed of the Lieutenant de la Sen6chauss6e sitting 
with two assessors. On March 20, he claimed that his 
wife should not remain with her father during the hearing 
of the case. If she would not return to him he claimed 
that she should temporarily retire to a convent. He was 
moderate and conciliatory, and this alone won over the 
public. He moved the audience even to tears, and quite 
disconcerted M. de Marignane, who had sneered at the 
opening of his address. His reply was skilful and his 
demand was agreed to. His adversaries appealed to the 
Parlement and refused settlement by consent. Mirabeau 
had published his wife's letters and after each affectionate 
passage he inscribed this simple and decisive comment, 
"Mme. de Mirabeau since she wrote this 'has never seen her 
husband from whom it is said that she wishes to be 
separated," The repetition of this phrase produced a 
tremendous effect, but the publication of intimate corre- 
spondence of this kind challenged and justified reprisals. 
The other side did not hesitate ; they inserted in a memoir 
the letters in which the Marquis de Mirabeau picturesquely 
and insultingly dissected his son. They were deadly, and 
the Bailli, who was quite overwhelmed by them, wrote to 
his brother, "What put it into your head to say all that 
you did, and to add that I have proof of it, which is not 
the case ? " One quotation is enough to show their tenor ; 
" Ape, wolf, or fox, all parts are alike to him ; he can 
assume them all without effort." It was in vain that before 
the trial the Marquis, in order to avoid a scandal, had 
appealed to his daughter-in-law's compassion in a melan- 

lOI 



MIRABEAU 

choly and moving letter, and to M. de Marignane's 
prudence and good faith in an angry and indignant 
communication. His son's impetuosity broke down all 
barriers. 

At the end of May the case, which was awaited with 
impatience, came before the Grand Chamber of the Parle- 
ment. Portalis, assured of a tribunal in which the Marig- 
nane family had friends and even allies, made a searching 
attack on Mirabeau. He gave an ex parte account of the 
terrible vicissitudes of his opponent's life, and ended a 
violently aggressive speech with the direct thrust : " It is 
better to be defamed than to be praised by you." 

Mirabeau had several days in which to prepare his 
reply, and he did not lose his time. On June 2, before an 
audience which had shouldered the guards aside, broken 
the barriers, invaded the doors, and even occupied the 
windows, he made a speech which lasted for five hours. 
"He spoke, or rather he howled, and roared so much," 
said his father, "that the lion's mane dripped with sweat 
and whitened with foam." He was an improvised advo- 
cate, but his speech was no improvisation, and his voice 
was the most eloquent ever heard in a court of justice. 
He enriched the history of forensic eloquence with a 
masterpiece. Almost nothing in it is out of date. The 
lucid and logical solidity of the argument, the contagious 
vivacity, the restrained irony, the vehement and fiery 
indignation of the language defy time. From his judges, 
whom he knew to be prejudiced, and whom he could not 
hope to convince, Mirabeau appealed to his fellow country- 
men, whom he took to witness, and to public opinion, the 
strength of which he divined, and in which he was already 
finding the source and substance of his power. 

The unity of this speech is such, and the connection 
of the parts is so close that it is difficult to quote from 
it, and it is almost impossible to analyze. It transcends 
the incident which occasioned it, and goes to the root of 

102 



THE LAWSUITS AT PONTARLIER 

the matter. "The petty warfare of a public prosecutor 
is beneath a spirit inflamed with passion." How could 
he explain the dangers of allowing Mme. de Mirabeau 
to remain in her father's house without explaining what 
her father was, what sort of a house he kept, what sort 
of person she was herself ? Mirabeau explains all this, 
and what he cannot say he insinuates, and his reticences 
and his allusions are perhaps even more convincing than 
what he expresses in precise terms. "You will hear," 
he cries, "how she has been seen out walking without her 
father, in company without her father, at the play with- 
out her father. . . . She has been seen making herself 
very agreeable to an unmarried man. Has not experience 
shown that temptations are a trial to virtue, and that the 
misfortune of succumbing to such temptation is too often 
the penalty of the presumption which voluntarily exposes 
itself to them. Do I insult Mme. de Mirabeau by remind- 
ing her of this fact more than she would insult herself 
by showing that she had not forgotten it ? " 

The publication of the letters from his father, "the 
old man of genius," whom they had not shrunk from 
wounding, incited him to a remarkable piece of audacity. 
In them he had been denounced, and his feelings out- 
raged; but his anger did not turn against their author. 
He had not the breadth of mind to discern the truth, 
"because he was merely repeating from a distant spot the 
gossip which afflicted his fatherly heart, the gossip which 
so many rash and rancorous tongues in this province have 
echoed, and which I will certainly track to its source. 
So that my calumniators in attesting my father's letters 
are in most cases attesting only what they say them- 
selves." He sets out the eight grievances alleged against 
him. "Let us take breath and answer," he says. One 
by one he takes them up, presses them to their utmost, 
and analyzes them, neglecting no detail of what he de- 
scribes as "the defamatory romance" of Mme. de 

103 



MIRABEAU 

Mirabeau. What he cannot deny he explains away, and 
when he makes an admission with what irony he character- 
izes the part taken in the facts by others ! One day, it is 
said, he was drunk, "but so were many others, as M. de 
Marignane will no doubt remember." He had been un- 
faithful to his wife. "Ah, but our manners are not so 
pure that we have the right to regard a man as infamous 
who is suspected or even convicted of adultery ! " He 
has repented of his faults, and "what heart of iron has 
the right to refuse pardon to a young man in love ? " 
Mme. de Mirabeau says she has been calumniated — she 
shall be her own judge, and thereupon he read the letter 
written by his wife to her lover to break off their relations, 
adding, "meanwhile, while Mme. de Mirabeau is prepar- 
ing an explanation of this letter, which appears to me to 
require none, I may inform M. Portalis that in spite of 
his magniloquent challenges I have in my portfolio writ- 
ings of more than one kind, all of which are very proper 
to sustain and amplify with many episodes the romance 
with which he will no doubt embellish this communica- 
tion." 

Mirabeau, by throwing this letter into the case, dared 
and risked everything : he had no longer anything to 
lose. He turned on Portalis, whom he accused of 
cowardice in writing without having the courage to sign 
the infamous libels in which his father was outraered. 
He respects the noble profession of the Bar. "But if a 
member of it, under cover of the impunity alldwed to be 
due to a profession whose independence is its very life 
. . . instead of eloquence vomits forth insulting declara- 
tions, lies, fury and calumny, if he invents or distorts 
facts, if he garbles or falsifies all the documents he quotes, 
and takes care not to read what he is quoting in order to 
preserve for himself the excuse that his memory is defect- 
ive, such a man sinks from the freest of all situations, 
and becomes enslaved to the most servile of passions. 

104 



THE LAWSUITS AT PONTARLIER 

Martial has named him for me — he is a merchant of words, 
of lies and slander. . . ." This terrible apostrophe 
proved too much for Portalis, who was carried out of 
court in a swoon at the end of the sitting. 

Mirabeau, moreover, had made up his mind to leave 
nothing unsaid, and he carried out his intention. He 
knew that his judges were partial, and with supreme 
audacity he turned this to account. While he affirmed 
his respect for their virtue, he hurled a challenge in their 
teeth. "Finally, my lords, men already dare to announce 
what the judgment in this ill-starred case will be. Yes, 
the confidence of my adversaries is such that they have 
no care even for appearances, and, unless they said openly 
that they mean to dictate the judgment, they could not 
more clearly proclaim that they have the Supreme Court 
in their pockets. This blasphemy does not appal me. 
Rather, it redoubles my confidence. I expect from the 
court a judgment all the more equitable because it is 
common knowledge that my adversaries are honoured with 
the friendship and alliance of a very large number of my 
judges. They will mete out justice, not to their alliances, 
not to the private entreaties that may be addressed to them, 
but to the arguments that have been advanced before 
them ; and no doubt they know too well in what the true 
greatness of a judge consists to descend from their tribunal 
where they would leave both dignity and virtue behind 
them, and degrade themselves to the level of the litigants 
between whom they have to judge ! " 

From the effect still produced by these words, which 
have lost the warmth and colour imparted to them by 
the voice, the gestures and the accent of the speaker, it is 
easy to judge of the effect they produced, seconded by 
the commanding stature, the burning eyes, and the power- 
ful organ of Mirabeau. The public rapturously applauded. 
Joubert, Mirabeau's counsel, next spoke, demanding the 
restitution of the Marquis's letters, and after him Portalis, 

105 



MIRABEAU 

who was moderate for reasons of policy; then, on June 17, 
Mirabeau made a second speech. Ahhough a projected 
compromise embarrassed him in his choice of means, he 
was not inferior to himself. He was heard a third time in 
order that he might have the pleasure of refuting by 
anticipation the conclusions of the advocate-general, whose 
pleadings he had succeeded in obtaining, and whom he 
completely disconcerted. Finally, on July 5, the court 
gave judgment both on the specific point and on the 
whole case. Mme. de Mirabeau obtained a judicial 
separation and restitution of the Marquis's letters was 
refused. 

On the very day of the judgment Mirabeau challenged 
the Comte de Gallifet, whom he accused of having taken 
his wife's part with too much warmth, and slightly wounded 
him in the arm. Before the judgment the Marquis 
had written : " It is beyond question that he has turned 
public opinion, which is now for the most part in his 
favour. That is the common view here, and it is sup- 
ported by letters from the scenes of the trial, both from 
Grenoble and from Avignon. The curious thing is that I 
hear the same thing from Italy. What glory for the descend- 
ant of our ancestors ! " He would have preferred success 
in the case to the glory which he mentions with so much 
irony. He was disappointed and angry, and saw in this 
final stroke of fate the ruin of all his hopes. He refused 
to see his son, and surrendered to the Minister the Royal 
order which placed him in his power. " His ways are not 
my ways," he declared, "my task is complete and finished. 
It is now for him to take henceforth the course he thinks 
fit. I can no longer either help him, or guide him, or be 
responsible for him." Thus left to himself Mirabeau 
profited by his liberty to forget the Bailli, which was the 
basest ingratitude on his part, and to enter an appeal 
against the judgment, which was dismissed. In support 
of his plea he had written a memoir, the publication of 

106 



THE LAWSUITS AT PONTARLIER 

which was forbidden, in February 1784, by M. de Miro- 
mesnil the Keeper of the Seals. With him Mirabeau had 
a somewhat warm discussion, which he printed at Maes- 
tricht as an introduction to the prohibited memoir. The 
Minister avenged himself by allowing the document to 
circulate. 



107 



CHAPTER VII 

MADAME DE NEHRA 

Money difficulties— Madame de Nehra — Journey to England — Financial 
polemics — Collaborations — Mirabeau and Beaumarchais. 

MiRABEAU had now broken with his father, and, having 
no more to expect from him, did not think it necessary 
to humour him any longer. He therefore sued him for an 
account of his guardianship, and obtained an annual allow- 
ance for his subsistence of 3000 livres, which was not 
subject to any deductions. The remainder of the property 
at issue remained subject to dispute and litigation, the 
Marquis alleging that his son owed him very large sums 
of money advanced by him both for the purpose of having 
him pursued and arrested, and for his maintenance at 
Vincennes. 

Reduced to the pittance of 3000 livres, Mirabeau, who 
did not receive a penny in advance, saw that he would 
have some difficulty in making a living. In May 1784 he 
had written to Vitry, a new friend whose acquaintance he 
had made at Boncheis after his release, to ask for a loan 
of ten francs, "which I must have, and for which, on my 
honour, I do not know where to turn." Some days later 
he pledged at the Mont de Pi^t6 his "coat embroidered 
with silver, and his half-mourning vest and breeches of 
cloth of silver, and winter laces." On a reconciliation with 
his mother, he had contracted conjointly with her a loan 
from a money-lender of 30,000 livres, of which he had as 
usual the lion's share, for he got 19,000 livres, and she 
only 2000. With his habitual prodigality and almost 
incredible carelessness about money matters, he had taken 

108 



MADAME DE NEHRA 

up his abode in the Chaussee d'Antin, and was living there 
sumptuously with hired furniture. Indeed his conduct, 
though it did not excuse all his father's methods of dealing 
with him, proved how little this great baby was capable of 
being left to himself, and how much he needed a guide or 
a guardian. At this juncture his good fortune provided 
him with a guardian angel in the shape of Mme. de Nehra, 
whom he had met in the spring of 1784 while visiting a 
married woman with whom he was carrying on an intrigue, 
and whom he pretended was his cousin. 

Mme. de Nehra was the natural daughter of Willem van 
Haren, an eminent Dutch statesman. She had been 
brought up by his brother at Zwolle, in the province of 
Overykel, and after the death of her father and her uncle 
she had retired to the fashionable convent of the Petites 
Orphelines at Paris. It was there that Mirabeau by chance 
made her acquaintance. She was only seventeen, pretty, 
blonde, fragile and fresh-coloured, gentle and good- 
tempered. Her angelic physiognomy and her magical 
powers of seduction fascinated the monster from whose 
ugliness she at first recoiled in terror : little by little she 
grew accustomed to his features, which seemed appropriate 
to the character of his wit. She came to see that "his face 
was expressive, his mouth charming, and his smile full of 
grace." Mirabeau's eloquence, which even in its highest 
flights he knew how to invest with an irresistible charm, 
completed the conquest! At first there was no more than 
an affectionate friendship between them. Mme. de Nehra 
accompanied Mirabeau to Belgium, where he went to get 
his Memoir printed: she returned his mistress. "At this 
time," she says, "everything was against him; family, 
friends, and fortune, all had abandoned him. He had 
nothing left but me, and I wished to fill the place of all. 
I therefore sacrificed every plan which was incompatible 
with our relations : I gave up my quiet life to share the 
perils which surrounded him in his stormy career, and I 

109 



MIRABEAU 

swore thenceforth to live for him alone, to follow him 
everywhere, and to expose myself to everything in order 
to help him in good or evil fortune." 

When a woman of such a character surrenders herself 
she gives up body and soul. Mme. de Nehra did not take 
back what she had given, and though Mirabeau afterwards 
sacrificed her, he loved her long, and as he had never loved 
before. Sophie had inspired in him an ardent passion, in 
which his mind and his senses were engaged but not his 
heart. This time his heart was concerned. "Your por- 
trait," he wrote, "your image, my memories, my prayers, 
my dreams — all this is you, indeed, but you who were here 
and are now absent ! I have been in love ; I love my 
friends dearly, but never has any one made me feel as I 
feel to-day this entire confidence, this reciprocation of all 
my sentiments and faculties, this existence in you which 
makes me feel that I can never live except through you." 
In all the secret correspondence from Vincennes there is 
not a single phrase which gives as this does the feeling of 
true tenderness, complete surrender, and, in a word, of a 
sincere and profound love. Mirabeau took the two final 
syllables of his fair friend's Christian names, Henriette 
Am^lie, and made of them a curious and pretty pet name, 
Yet-Lie, by which he always called her. She set his house 
in order, made him sell his horses and his carriage, and 
surrounded his labours with affection and comfort. He 
was at this time preparing a work on the Order of Cincin- 
natus, which had been founded in the United States for 
the officers who had taken part in the War of Independ- 
ence. The occasion of this work was a pamphlet which 
Franklin had allowed him to translate; but fearing that 
M. de Miromesnil might change his mind, and hearing 
even (though no doubt falsely) that a lettre de cachet was 
about to be launched against him, Mirabeau decided to 
leave France. 

Accompanied by Mme. de Nehra, he left for London in 

no 




MADAME DE NEHRA 
(Prom a miniattire belonging to M. Gabriel Lucas de Montigny) 



MADAME DE NEHRA 

August 1784, and there he renewed acquaintance with the 
brothers EHiot, whom he had known at the Pension 
Choquard, and who had not forgotten him. One of these, 
Gilbert, who was the first to receive him, was struck by 
his talents and his knowledge; but if Mirabeau's intellect 
seemed to him more mature, he found that his character 
had not altered. He describes him as "ardent and positive 
in his conversation, awkward in his manners, ugly of 
countenance, clumsy in person and dirty in apparel as 
ever, and withal as self-sufficient as we remember him 
twenty years ago at school." Mirabeau made the acquaint- 
ance of Samuel Romilly the jurist, of Lord Shelburne, 
afterwards Marquis of Lansdowne, of the Duke of Rich- 
mond, of Dr. Price and of Burke. Brissot, afterwards his 
friend, was then in London, editing the Counier d'Europe. 
Mirabeau spent eight months in London, but neither the 
country nor its 'politica>l constitution appealed to him. 
"The land of wine," he said, "is better than the land of 
coal — even from the point of view of its influence on one's 
moral nature." Perhaps his failure to realize the diplo- 
matic and journalistic ambitions by which he was then 
and thenceforth obsessed had something to do with his 
disillusionment. 

His Considerations on the Order of Cincinnatus appeared 
in London. This book, with which he was well pleased, 
like all the others which he wrote at this time, raises the 
question how far he was helped by collaboration. In his 
Souvenirs Dumont observes that Mirabeau "found him- 
self absolutely incapable of a sustained piece of writing 
unless he was supported and guided by a previous work 
which he could borrow." All the contemporary evidence 
is in agreement on this point. This orator of genius wrote 
with difficulty, and found it hard to get in train. He was 
a good writer only in so far as he was a great orator. The 
passages of his books which have had merit enough to 
survive are those which have the form, the movement and 

III 



MIRABEAU 

the development of oratory, and they bear out Dumont 
when he says, "If one considers him as an author it must 
be agreed that all his works, without exception, are pieces 
of marqueterie, in which little would remain if each of his 
colleagues took back the share he contributed. He had 
the gift, however, of imparting a greater brilliancy to 
whatever he touched himself, and of scattering here and 
there flashes of vivid insight, original expressions, and 
apostrophes full of fire and eloquence." His Considera- 
tions on the Order of Cincinnatus were a sharp criticism 
of the institution in a republic of a hereditary nobility. 
Chamfort greatly assisted Mirabeau in the preparation of 
this work, but it is impossible to determine the extent of 
his ^collaboration. There is a passage on "the gilded 
patriciate," the "fine oratorical movement of which" was 
praised by Mirabeau himself. The passage, which, in fact, 
was his own, is excellent, and what he says therein about 
ribands and decoration has lost none of its force or, alas ! 
of its truth. 

Another book, inspired by a letter of Clavi^re's and 
entitled Doutes sur la Uberte de I'Escaut, appeared early 
in 1785. On the occasion of a project, attributed to the 
Emperor Joseph H, of restoring to his subjects in Brabant 
their freedom to navigate the Escaut, Mirabeau considered 
not only the interests of the Dutch, whose independence he 
defended, but the European situation. This piece of occa- 
sional writing shows Mirabeau's gift for foreign affairs. 
Had it not been for his disorderly life he might have been 
a great diplomatist. One of his favourite ideas was that 
there should be a cordial and final rapprochement between 
England and France. In a letter to La Fage, towards the 
end of his sojourn at Vincennes, he had already written, 
"If there is a fine plan in the world it is that which would 
associate the greatness of France and England, founding 
their tremendous power on a basis of equity." In this book 
on the Escaut he urged the signature of a commercial treaty 

112 



MADAME DE NEHRA 

which would "make national jealousies disappear for ever," 
and "lead to an alliance solid, sincere and everlasting." 

An irritating, absurd and humiliating lawsuit with his 
valet and secretary Hardy had added to the difficulties of 
Mirabeau's stay in London, and he found it necessary to 
leave. Mme. de Nehra took certain steps with the Baron 
de Breteuil, Minister of the Royal Household, the result of 
which was to convince Mirabeau that he could re-enter 
France without being molested, and he accordingly re- 
turned to Paris on April i, 1785. His first intention seems 
to have been to take up his quarters at Mirabeau. "We 
have the means of going to Provence," he wrote to Mme. 
de Nehra, "and assuredly the means of living there, since 
at Manosque Mme. de Mirabeau, her son and the nurse, 
a maid, a cook, a manservant and myself lived well enough 
on the sum in question," It was Mme. de Nehra's idea. 
She thought that a year or two of retirement, during which 
Mirabeau might complete a great work, would be of much 
advantage to him. But would his creditors have left him 
in peace ? Another consideration (the illness of a child of 
the sculptor Lucas de Montigny, whom he had adopted) 
prevented his departure, and the efforts made by Clavi^re, 
whom Mirabeau had known at Neuchatel, were finally suc- 
cessful in keeping him in Paris. Claviere had a profound 
knowledge of economic and financial questions, but he was 
timid, and he felt that his rather faded talent required the 
help of the boldness and the brilliancy of Mirabeau, who, he 
said, "had the head of a great man." Claviere introduced 
Mirabeau to the great financier Panchaud, banker to the 
Court, who was engaged in speculation on a great scale, 
and who fascinated Mirabeau by his skill and his "eagle 
eye." 

From these two men Mirabeau learned the art of finance, 

though, to be accurate, he had begun to interest himself in 

it in London, where he studied the famous Compte rendu 

de Necker. Through them he was also brought into touch 

I 113 



MIRABEAU 

with M. de Calonne, and in six months he published five 
works, of which the first, entitled the Caisse d'Escompte, 
appeared five or six weeks after his return from London. 

Extraordinary and even prodigious as were Mirabeau's 
powers of assimilation and of output, a fertility involv- 
ing the production of long pamphlets founded on very 
serious study, would be inexplicable if the nature of his 
methods of work was not known. Brissot said, not with- 
out reason, "Mirabeau was almost always an impresario. 
As an author he had, as he said himself, a special talent 
for delivering Clavi^re, with whose ideas he was so 
saturated that he made them his own, and imparted to them 
a flavour of originality." The Caisse d'Escompte, if we 
may believe Brissot, came from this source ; it was followed 
■by four other works. The Bank of Spain, known as the 
Bank of St. Charles, Letter to M. le Couteulx de la Noraye 
on the Bank of Spain and on the Caisse d'Escompte, On 
the Shares of the Compagnie des Eaux of Paris, Answer to 
the author of the Administrators of the Compagnie des 
Eaux of Paris. The titles of these books are enough to 
show that they were polemical and occasional in character, 
and they have now no interest except for the student of the 
financial history of the eighteenth century. An analysis 
of them would be apt to run into a discussion of the 
financial operations of Panchaud, with whom Mirabeau 
spent most of his time, or of the economic writings of 
Ciavi^re. When the pamphlet against the Compagnie des 
Eaux appeared, though it was signed in big letters with 
the name of Mirabeau, it was Clavi^re who was summoned 
before the Lieutenant of Police, and it is known practically 
to a certainty that the first attack on the Bank of St. Charles 
was drafted by Brissot and Clavi^re. 

The Marquis, always vigilant, wrote of his son : "This 
gentleman is now in the pay of the speculators; they use 
him as one uses an ill-conditioned, dangerous cur, which 
is set on to bark at the heels of the passers-by, and is 

114 



MADAME DE NEHRA 

always ready to snap when he is bidden." Mirabeau 
admits that he received assistance from friends, "who 
backed his opinions," but was he paid by Calonne, whose 
pohcy and whose interests he supported in the first two 
books mentioned above? He has vehemently denied it, 
and in this case there is nothing which would justify us in 
doubting his word. In order to enrich himself he had only 
to be silent, and it was no exaggeration when he said that 
he "could sway the pendulum of the Bourse as he wished, 
and that his silence was worth its weight in gold." The 
Comte de La Marck, whose testimony has high moral 
authority, states that the Bank of St. Charles went so far 
as to make Mirabeau the most tempting propositions, on 
condition that he did not publish his attack, but that 
Mirabeau declined them. His action is all the more 
meritorious as he had had to send all that he had to his 
Mont de Piete in order to obtain the means of livelihood. 
Alas, that we must add that he sold to Calonne as his own 
a Memoir on Municipalities lent to him by Dupont (de 
Nemours) on the occasion of one of his visits to Vincennes ! 
The affair of the Compagnie des Eaux was the occasion 
of a dispute between Mirabeau and Beaumarchais. The 
company was attacked by the former and defended by the 
latter. The Mirabelles, as the author of the Barbier de 
Seville observed, did not have the best of a duel in which 
wit was the deadliest weapon. "It is for a discredited 
advocate," said Beaumarchais, "to plead everything when 
he despairs of his case. An eloquent man has everything 
to lose when he ceases to respect himself, and eloquent my 
opponent assuredly is." He also asserted that the author 
of the pamphlet he was attacking "was in the power of 
operators known to have the strongest interest m the fall 
of the market." Mirabeau replied by developing his thesis, 
and then devoted a long page, full of treacherous insinua- 
tions, to Beaumarchais himself. Some phrases in it would 
be amusing enough if Mirabeau had not the cynical 

115 



MIRABEAU 

audacity to pose as the champion of morahty. "Every 
order in the State," he wrote, "every class in society, every 
law, every rule, every decency of life is lacerated, insulted, 
outraged." This allusion to the audacities of the Manage 
de Figaro comes somewhat surprisingly from the pen of its 
author, who four years later, by his power of speech, was 
to transform the words of Beaumarchais into deeds. 
Mirabeau is more pleasing in a less virtuous and more 
natural pose. 

He was far, however, from lacking either wit or finesse. 

Lucas de Montigny in his Memoirs, the documents in 

which (though they should be received with caution) are 

always so valuable, has published a letter which Mirabeau 

meant to send to Calonne, and which was such as "never 

stipendiary wrote to his master." His friends prevented its 

being printed, and Mirabeau's audacity never got beyond 

the stage of intention. It would, however, be a pity not 

to give a specimen of its quality. There- are delightful 

things in it. Mirabeau had a great gift for mishandling 

ministers. In his Lettres de Cachet there is to be found 

the following curious passage, which is perhaps not even 

yet quite out of date : " I take it that ministers, for the most 

part new men whose position is transitory and precarious, 

and who have everything to gain and almost nothing to 

lose, are in haste to push their brief authority as far as they 

can in order that they may make their fortunes rapidly, 

that they may provide themselves with instruments, that 

they may realize their desires. They must profit by the 

instant as it flies — to-morrow they will have ceased to 

be. . . ." Is the following amusing apostrophe applicable 

only to M. de Calonne? "You are very clever, sir — clever 

enough at least to deceive both yourself and others. 

People are too ready to believe that you know all that you 

understand, that you understand all that you listen to so 

attentively with that clever and cunning expression in your 

eyes, that they can easily persuade you to do what has 

ii6 



MADAME DE NEHRA 

been demonstrated to you. They are much mistaken. 
Your only care is to strike an attitude, mental and physical, 
which flatters your self-love, which increases your enjoy- 
ment of the most trifling vanities, which helps you to escape 
from the difficulties of the moment, which will ensure that 
you will be minister to-morrow, without reckoning how you 
will be minister in a week's time. You want not advice 
but expedients, not friends but advertisers, not truth but 
panegyric. Provided that your society — I had almost said 
your clique — offers up the requisite amount of incense, that 
those whose interests you serve do not reproach you, and 
that nothing distracts you from your pleasures, things are 
going v^eW enough. You put off for months and months, 
and then you take an hour to decide what requires the most 
sustained attention and the most profound consideration. 
In a word, we should deceive ourselves with a pleasant 
fiction if we pretended to believe that your policy has any 
object but the success of your intrigues and the satisfaction 
of the interest of your most trifling passions." "That 
mountebank Beaumarchais," as he called him, could not 
have put it better himself. 

This violent pamphlet was written at Berlin. His cam- 
paign against the Compagnie des Eaux had almost led 'to 
an open breach with Calonne, whose interests and connec- 
tions it threatened. He had had a lively interview with 
the minister, and the situation was becoming difficult. 
On the advice of his friends, the Abbe de Perigord and the 
Due de Lauzun, he decided to leave France for a time. 



117 



CHAPTER VIII 

MIRABEAU IN GERMANY 

Interviews with Frederick the Great — Mirabeau and Talleyrand-:-Views 
on foreign policy — The Berlin Correspondence : its historical and 
literary importance — Ambitions and disappointments. 

Mirabeau left for Berlin at the end of 1785. Mme. 
de Nehra, who accompanied him, relates that between Toul 
and Verdun several pistol shots were fired at their carriage, 
and she could not tell whether it was a practical joke or a 
serious attempt on their lives. She also relates that at 
Frankfort-on-the-Main Mirabeau had "an intrigue of 
gallantry." At Paris she had already become aware of his 
infidelities. If he but saw a pretty face; if "a woman 
made him the least advances, he took fire at once." But 
as she was sure of his heart that was enough to satisfy her 
affection, and she resigned herself to the caprices of his 
temperament. 

After making some stay at Leipsic, where he frequented 
the society of the savants of the place, Mirabeau arrived at 
Berlin about the middle of January 1786. M. de Ver- 
gennes, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, had given him a 
letter of introduction to the French Ambassador, Count 
d'Esterno, whose reception of him was, to say the least of 
it, reserved. Mirabeau, with confident boldness, applied 
directly for an audience with Frederick II. The great 
king granted it at once and received him kindly, though he 
forgot next day the disguised offer of service which his 
visitor had made in a written petition. His brother. Prince 
Henry, was very cordial, was, at first at any rate, by no 
means offended at Mirabeau 's familiarity, and without 

118 



MIRABEAU IN GERMANY 

making him a confidant showed interest in his talents and 
was pleased to be amused with his manners and his wit.N 

When he went to Germany, Mirabeau intended to carry 
out the idea which had been in his mind while he was in 
England, of writing a sort of periodical, containing a 
summary of all that was essential in contemporary science 
and literature. This plan came to nothing, but, always 
anxious to seize on the topic of the moment, he wrote a 
letter about Cagliostro and Lavater, who were then much 
in vogue owing to the affair of the Queen's necklace. In 
this letter he attacked the sect of the illuminati who had 
great influence with the German princes, and opposed to 
their pretensions the benefits of a rationalistic philosophy. 
In this fugitive piece nothing deserves to be recalled but 
a precise allusion to "a revolution which is ever becoming 
more necessary in our legal system," the principles of 
which he had already laid down in his Lettres de Cachet. 
"An accused person," he said, "must be tried according 
to the most regular forms. His imprisonment must be 
according to law. His detention should also be according 
to law : it should be humane, and even gentle. He should 
have advice, help, the means of defence. He should be 
made aware of everything which can contribute to his 
exculpation. . . ." 

The chief advantage which Mirabeau derived from this 
first visit to Berlin was the friendship which he formed there 
with distinguished persons, such as Sir James Murray, 
Ewart the Secretary of the British Embassy, and particu- 
larly Dohm, the historian, philosopher and economist, to 
whom he owed much. He was interested in everything, 
and questioned everybody, from the ministers down to 
artisans. An eminent lady named Rahel remembered 
him very vividly. "His slightest movements," she said, 
"showed that he was a man full of energy, who examined 
everything at first hand, who desired to know everything, 
and to get to the bottom of all things." Dohm has left an 

119 



MIRABEAU 

equally characteristic impression. "He carried the art of 
putting questions to such a pitch, that it is difficult to 
convey an idea of it to any one who was not accustomed 
to his conversation." 

Recalled to France by his personal affairs,/ Mirabeau had 
a second audience, on April 17, with Frederick, who, 
though he was very ill, kept him for nearly an hour, and 
produced a profound impression on him.) At Brunswick 
he did not succeed in seeing the reigning' Duke who was 
"so interesting to meet, from every point of view," He 
had left his "horde" at Berlin. The letters he wrote to 
Mme. de Nehra there show great tenderness, and a delicacy 
of sentiment revealing genuine affection. When he 
reached Paris the affair of the necklace was exciting 
universal and passionate interest. Mirabeau was favour- 
able to the Cardinal de Rohan, but he was under no 
illusions as to the far-reaching effects likely to be produced 
by this horrible scandal. "Destiny is a strange thing," 
he wrote, "hell has never belched forth more perilous 
corruptions than there are in this business. What a 
country ! W^hat men ! What degeneracy ! What cor- 
ruption ! " 

Corruption he found everywhere. Of the Abbe de 
P^rigord, the future Talleyrand, he wrote to his beloved 
Yet-Lie : "He has often spoken to me of the declared 
passion which he had for you, and I confess that in it all 
there was a perfidious cunning which made me detest him. 
For the rest he is still in the highest favour, and is con- 
stantly losing in consideration and in wit what he gains 
in suppleness and courtiership." Mirabeau had met the 
Abbe de Perigord at the house of the banker Panchaud. 
Their characters and temperaments were antagonistic, but 
they were brought together by their interests and their 
ambitions. Talleyrand, who then occupied the high posi- 
tion of Agent-General to the Clergy, was interested in 
diplomatic questions and in financial affairs, and from 

120 



MIRABEAU IN GERMANY 

this double point of view it was possible that Mirabeau 
might be useful to him at Berlin. He contrived to 
persuade M. de Calonne to entrust him with a mission, 
and a report written by Mirabeau on June 2, 1786, on the 
European situation, no doubt helped to secure this result. 
With its deliberate conciseness this report is a memoir of 
remarkable power, which gives a striking picture of France 
exhausted and indecisive contrasted with England and 
Prussia, "Is it not time," he concludes, "that we re-estab- 
lished our affairs abroad and revictualled our people at 
home? " And Mirabeau once again, with a persistency in 
which we must recognize a definite policy, urged the desir- 
ability of an offensive and defensive alliance with England. 
He arrived at Berlin on July 21. Immediately after his 
departure, and while he was still on the journey, he sent 
off his first dispatch. His last was written on the very 
day of his return, and is dated January 19, 1787. In the 
intervening six months, Mirabeau sent off about seventy 
dispatches, which were received, deciphered, and corrected 
by Talleyrand, and submitted to Calonne, Vergennes, 
and the King himself. He had no official mission. He 
lived, amassed information, and worked outside the 
regular diplomatic system. This subordinate and unac- 
knowledged position embarrassed him, and not less so the 
French Ambassador, who several times expressed surprise 
and even resentment. It must be admitted that, making 
allowances for Mirabeau 's characteristic exaggerations, 
the comparison of the dispatches on events of importance, 
is not in favour of the Comte d'Esterno. The semi-official 
envoy saw further and clearer than the official ambassador, 
and he wrote in a very different style. No one but Mirabeau 
could have produced the dispatches. His whole self is in 
them, his extraordinary clear-sightedness, his wide know- 
ledge, his avowed or unconscious cynicism. They have 
led some to compare him with Saint-Simon, but this is to 
do him too much honour. Some happy formulae, some 

121 



MIRABEAU 

original phrases, some descriptions boldly dashed on the 
paper are not enough to make him the equal of the 
prodigious artist who indeed "wrote satanic and immortal 
pages." Mirabeau has none of Saint-Simon's brilliancy 
and high relief, none of his concentrated power nor his 
picturesque and mordant vigour, which in a few character- 
istic touches fixes a character and focuses a man. 

But though he falls far short of this unique genius his 
talent has its place, and the rank which Mirabeau holds by 
virtue of the letters from Berlin is not to be despised. His 
account of Frederick's death and funeral is well observed 
and well expressed. Portraits such as he gives of Fred- 
erick William II, Prince Henry of Prussia, and the Duke 
of Brunswick, in spite of some exaggerations, remain 
worthy of the dignity of history. His description of the 
Prussian Court, that hotbed of base intrigue, bitter jealousy, 
lamentable weakness and degrading vice, is lively, animated 
and full of colour, and on the whole, is so like the reality 
that it would be unjust to regard it as a partisan view 
suggested by ignorance or spite. The refutation attempted 
by Baron Trenck is often an unconscious and sufficient 
proof of its truth. Mirabeau's language is precise and 
clear, never declamatory, and it is purged of the over- 
emphasis which elsewhere pervades and spoils his best 
work. If he speaks as a diplomatist is expected to speak, 
he sees as French diplomacy (which he described as the 
most inactive in Europe) was then rarely capable of seeing. 
The Dutch question developed on lines different from those 
on which he predicted under the influence of the confidences 
of the Duke of Brunswick. But he expressed views on the 
failure of certain parts of the achievements of Frederick 
the Great, on the decadence and revival of Prussia to 
which the most scientific historians have done full justice. 
On the Crown Prince he pronounced a judgment which 
M. Albert Sorel describes as a "presentiment of genius"; 
and indeed his prediction that, after Frederick William II, 

122 



MIRABEAU IN GERMANY 

Frederick William III would arise to repair his errors and 
reconstitute Prussia, is very striking. "Perhaps this 
young man," he said, "has a great destiny, and if he should 
become the pivot of some memorable revolution, far-seeing 
men will not be surprised." 

Mirabeau has been reproached for his taste for scanda- 
lous love affairs. But in the case of a sensual and depraved 
monarch like Frederick William II, these matters have 
their importance, and if history may not be silent 
about the part played by Fraulein von Voss at the Court 
of Berlin, why should the reader be surprised, still more 
why should he be shocked, if a secret agent should observe, 
measure, and record the temperature of the royal passions ? 
Mirabeau, however, yielded to his natural penchant for 
such things. He emphasizes them, and insists on them 
excessively. Tact was not his most conspicuous quality, 
and he is wanting in regard both for himself and for others. 
He forgot himself so far as to send a long letter full of 
good advice to Frederick William II, on the very day of 
his accession. The scheme of reform which he proposed 
contains excellent suggestions about military organisation, 
gratuitous justice, education, the freedom of the press, 
taxation, commerce and public works; but it was not for 
a foreigner to make them. It is not surprising that M. 
d'Esterno, at the express request of Prince Henry himself, 
should have complained to the French Government of the 
"presumption " which had led Mirabeau to use expressions 
"entirely unbecoming and very offensive." 

The further question remains whether the letter was 
really his own work. It has been said that he borrowed 
its essential points from a memoir by the minister Hertz- 
berg, and he was such an incorrigible plagiary, that there is 
nothing improbable in the suggestion. 

His Essay on Moses Mendelssohn and the political 
reform of the Jews, appeared about the same time, and 
in its broad-mindedness is worthy of his avowed object, 

123 



MIRABEAU 

which was to "encourage the reason and stimulate the 
pride " of a great prince. But how can one determine 
Mirabeau's share in a monograph in which he had for 
acknowledged collaborators "the good and estimable 
Dohm," Major Mauvillon and two Englishmen, whose 
work it was "almost enough merely to translate." 

The real glory of his sojourn at Berlin consists in 
another action. He may justly be credited with the return 
to France of the illustrious geometer Lagrange. He took 
the initiative in a dispatch in which he dwelt upon the 
modesty and the merit of the great savant, in a passage of 
real eloquence. Lagrange's return anticipated his own 
by very little. He was weary of the business of a 
"subaltern diplomatist," which brought him neither gain 
nor glory, neither immediate profit nor the prospect of 
a career. He was weary of serving a Government which 
did not seem to recognize his zeal or appreciate his 
qualities, and after frequent solicitations, which had no 
result, he called upon Talleyrand on November 7, to tell 
him definitely what they meant to do for him. "By birth, 
in short," he observes, "I am superior to most ministers. 
My capacity I leave you to estimate ; I should hesitate to do 
so myself. I do not think it should be difficult to find a 
place for me, and it is, therefore, for them to say the word. 
My own mind is finally made up." "The word" of a 
minister is not said in a moment. In the name of the 
Government Talleyrand assured Mirabeau that, "his corre- 
spondence was giving complete satisfaction, and that the 
King was reading it with much interest." But praises were 
no longer enough for Mirabeau. He considered that the 
time was come to pay him in some more material form of 
coin. When Talleyrand told him of Calonne's decision to 
convoke the Assembly of Notables, he decided that he had 
at last an opportunity of reconciling his interests with those 
of the nation : " My heart has not grown old, and if my 
enthusiasm is benumbed it is not dead. I felt that very 

124 



MIRABEAU IN GERMANY 

keenly to-day, and I look on the day on which you told 
me of the Convocation of Notables as one of the happiest in 
my life. No doubt it will soon be followed by a National 
Assembly, in which I see a new order of things which 
may regenerate the monarchy." He will not "disdain 
any kind of useful occupation." He would be secretary 
to the Notables, or would undertake a secret mission to 
Holland ; he would do anything, in fact, provided that 
they would employ him ; the question was, whether they 
would give him the chance. 



125 



CHAPTER IX 

THE APPROACH OF THE REVOLUTION 

Attacks on Calonne and Necker — The Monarchic Prussienne — Collabor- 
ation of Mauvillon — The Convocation of the Notables — Mirabeau 
demands States-General — Reconciliation with his father— A scandalous 
publication. 

Mirabeau returned to France in the last days of January 
1787, and was not long in perceiving that the Government 
was not disposed to utilize his capacities either at home 
or abroad. The most Calonne would do was to make use 
of him as a "satellite and a maker of manifestoes," who 
would blindly support his policy and sing his praises. 
This was a mistake, which he aggravated by adding that 
"he would arrange everything financially." Mirabeau 
accepted the challenge. The Denonciation de V Agiotage, 
which appeared on March 6, was his reply. Its effect was 
tremendous. Mirabeau was congratulated by the Notables 
and by the citizens of all classes, and observed that his 
book would in all probability shake the earth even to the 
steps of the sanctuary. If he did not altogether escape 
the reproach that he was wreaking a personal vengeance, 
he had at least the right to say that he was fundamentally 
self-consistent. Writing in May 1783, he had already 
condemned in his pamphlet, La Caisse d'Escompte, the 
Government interventions in stock exchange speculations, 
of which he now accused the Controller-General in terms 
of such vehement indignation. As to speculation, had he 
not denounced it, to go no further back, in the memor- 
andum which he handed to Calonne in June 1786, as 
"ruining Paris and sucking the blood of the kingdom," 

126 



APPROACH OF THE REViOLUTION 

showing at the same time that "our pubHc funds are in the 
gutter." Moreover, in denouncing with special insistence 
the speculations in the shares of the India Company, 
Mirabeau had a right to recall the fact that in their previous 
conversations the Minister had been completely silent on 
the subject. 

Mirabeau was therefore justified, by reference to his 
previous polemics, in affirming the continuity of his views 
and in evading the reproach that he was merely writing a 
pamphlet inspired by the circumstances of the moment. 
Further, what he repeated he said in a new way. In the 
whole series of his financial writings he had never been 
more vigorous or more spontaneous. This time he deter- 
mined to be himself, his whole self, and nothing but 
himself, and he gave of his best. Behind the author the 
orator appeared. The D enonciation de l' Agiotage is com- 
posed like a speech, of which it has the form, the develop- 
ment, the movement, the brilliancy and the vitality. From 
the exordium addressed to the King to the peroration in 
which he appeals to the Notables, the book has the rhythm 
of a harangue. If we read it almost at hazard, the pages 
teem with oratorical passages; nothing is wanting but the 
voice and gesture of the platform. Mirabeau stigmatizes 
speculation as the most culpable of trades. "What I ask, 
what compensation can it offer," he cries, "when its one 
result, its only product, is a mad gamble in which millions 
do nothing but pass from one purse to another, creating 
nothing but a crowd of shadows paraded by the folly of 
one day, and extinguished by the folly of the next ? " This 
phrase, with its opening interjection and its balanced 
rhythm, is made to be spoken, and there are others 
innumerable which produce the same impression. 

If the Denonciation de V Agiotage revealed Mirabeau's 
command of oratory, it also gave him an opportunity of 
rising from polemics to politics. He places his confidence 
in a revolution as necessary as it was imminent. "So 

127 



* 



MIRABEAU 

long," he said, "as the kingdom is not reorganized under 
a regular constitution we shall be no more than a society 
consisting of different orders without unity, a people 
almost without any social system. Such a government 
may perhaps suit an army, but not a numerous people 
living on the land which belongs to them." He demands 
the organization of provincial administrations, of public 
education, and has, in fact, a complete programme. 

Calonne was not named, but he had recognized himself 
in the following passage : — "Tell him that in carrying on 
a government to be skilful is to be honest ; good speeches 
will not atone for bad actions. Suppleness of wit, facility, 
a graceful style, eloquent preambles and fine orations are 
so many damning proofs against a Minister who excels 
in the exposition of sound principles, which he eludes or 
insults when it comes to putting them in practice." To 
what other Ministers could this apply ? At the same time 
that sentences of exile were being passed upon the 
speculators denounced by Mirabeau, the Baron de Breteuil 
was preparing a lettre de cachet to launch against him. 
He was warned in time by the Abb6 de Perigord, and by 
Calonne himself, who asserted that he had nothing to do 
with the proposed measure, and crossing the frontier he 
betook himself to Tongres near Liege. He was famous but 
penniless. "The Commonweal is an ungrateful mistress," 
he wrote to Mme. de Nehra, "and celebrity is a strange 
thing : on the one hand fame such that there is not a salon 
or a boudoir or a street-corner that does not ring with the 
name of Mirabeau ; on the other, hunger or something very 
like it." 

His exile was short. When he returned to Paris 
Calonne had ceased to be Minister, and Necker was on the 
point of succeeding him. Mirabeau hated him. In the 
Denonciation de I'Agiotage he had sharply attacked the 
"chimerical plan of providing for the cost of a war by 
continual loans without taxation, thus taking all the credit 

128 



APPROACH OF THE REVOLUTION 

and leaving to one's successors the really difficult work." 
This was the thesis to which he returned in two letters in 
which he examined with a passionate severity the acts of 
Necker's administration. He blamed him for the fall of 
Turgot, for the dearness of his own loans, for the intro- 
duction of the Genevese into French finance, and the 
admission of bankers into the administration of the Caisse 
d'Escompte, and he did not conceal his intention of pre- 
venting this "ambitious foreigner" from again governing 
France. There was, no doubt, some truth in certain of 
the reproaches heaped on Necker by Mirabeau, but his 
attack was couched in an excessively personal tone, it 
ignored the services he had rendered, and denied his in- 
contestable merit. It is difficult to attribute the bitterness, 
the violence and the injustice of this polemic to a mere 
difference of opinion on economical and financial 
questions. Mirabeau had no doubt espoused the cause of 
Panchaud and the Genevese refugees, who were very bitter 
against Necker, but he was also influenced by personal 
antagonism. The ostentatious virtue paraded by the 
banker of Geneva on all occasions, and his haughty aus- 
terity were highly displeasing to Mirabeau, whose tem- 
perament was so profoundly different, and to a doctrinal 
antagonism was added an antipathy of personalities which 
was even less easy to reconcile. 

Mirabeau was preparing a great work on Prussia, and in 
May 1787, he decided to go to Brunswick, where a dis- 
tinguished collaborator had amassed for him the necessary 
materials and notes. His departure was preceded by a bad 
action, for he published as part of the posthumous works 
of Turgot, Dupont's memoir on provincial Assemblies, 
which he had already sold to Calonne as his own, together 
with two less important pieces. Was this lamentable 
abuse of confidence to be attributed to his financial 
embarrassments? This is the probable explanation, as 
two months earlier Mirabeau was "much disappointed 
K 129 



MIRABEAU 

about money matters." Embarrassment was unhappily the 
melancholy accompaniment of his whole life, and it 
explains if it does not excuse the deplorable acts of base- 
ness of which he was guilty. 

His letters to Mme. de Nehra record the stages of his 
journey, and throw light upon his plans. Their gay 
simplicity and their tender delicacy reveal the best side 
of a nature in which there are so many disconcerting 
contrasts. He still loved Yet-Lie with a love in which 
there was a tinge of respect, and she exercised the happiest 
influence on his life, hitherto without guidance or order. 
"My poor Mirabeau," she said to him one day, "you have 
only one friend in the world, and that is myself." Mira- 
beau determined never to forget this, and as long as he 
kept this resolution he confided in Mme. de Nehra and 
took her advice about his affairs, which did not suffer 
thereby. His great idea at this time was to set up a 
printing press at Kiel with two partners. His book on 
Prussia and his collected writings were to be the first 
venture of the firm. "If in five years' time," he wrote, 
"we have not one of the finest book-selling and printing 
businesses in Europe I am no better than a fool." This 
project came to nothing. 

From abroad he followed the course of affairs in France. 
He was disquieted by Calonne's departure for England. 
"I do not understand this fury," he wrote, "or how 
Ministers can set such a dangerous precedent of bitter 
persecution of a colleague, for in such a matter precedents 
are all that is wanted. The prosecution of a Minister of 
Finance might perhaps have been really salutary in the 
public interest; but if so, it should have been carried out 
frankly, directly, vigorously, but above all impartially, and 
should not have been preceded by humiliation and a cloud 
of low intrigues." For his part he acquainted the Abbe 
de Perigord, for the information of M. de Brienne and 
M. de Montmorin, with the movements of the Prussian 



APPROACH OF THE REVOLUTION 

troops. Though often retarded by "the distractions of 
the Court," he worked furiously at his book, which was 
finished at the end of August. He was very proud of his 
new work, and wrote to Mme. de Nehra, "My dear friend, 
when this work appears I shall be little more than thirty- 
eight, and I venture to predict that it will make my name, 
and that my country may perhaps regret that such an 
observer was left without employment, and such work 
without a fit reward." 

The volume De la Monarchie prussienne did not appear 
until a year later. Mirabeau had dedicated it to his father, 
"to compensate a little by this honourable employment of 
his maturer years for the troubles which he had caused 
him by his stormy youth." The old economist was 
flattered by such homage from a man whom he regarded 
as "the rarest of his age," but his formidable critical sense 
pronounced the book to be "the enormous compilation of 
a frenzied workman." This is precisely the verdict which 
will now be passed upon it. Its four volumes represent 
a great deal of work, but Mirabeau was not the chief 
labourer. Major Mauvillon, an officer of Engineers, a 
teacher at Brunswick, himself the author of numerous 
works, procured him all the materials. Mirabeau wrote 
to him : " Hasten more than ever the completion of your 
great work, which will secure either our fame or our 
fortune, for if I print it, it shall be under our two names." 
The execution of the promise, which Mirabeau did not 
keep, would have been nothing more than an act of 
justice ; but it must be added that without Mirabeau's 
initiative, his incessant energy and his sustained stimula- 
tion Mauvillon could never have imagined or succeeded 
in carrying out so considerable an enterprise. Mirabeau's 
letter to him must be read in order to understand how 
irresistible were the solicitations which they contained. 
Mirabeau spared neither flatteries nor caresses nor tender 
persuasions, and his correspondent saw in him (as was 

131 



MIRABEAU 

really the case) "the most attractive of men, who of all 
people can make one think, believe, say and do exactly 
Mrhat he wishes." He sent plans, books, documents, maps, 
statistics; he suggested ideas and sketched developments, 
and he never spared expense. 

Thus counselled, directed, encouraged, charmed and 
remunerated, the learned Prussian officer gave up all his 
time and labour to the overwhelming task. It was not 
merely materials of all kinds, historical, geographical, 
economic, financial, military and statistical, that he fur- 
nished. There is a letter from Mirabeau which casts doubts 
even on the parts of the book which are attributed to him 
without question. "You quite understand, my friend, that 
the estimate of Frederick II must be just and severe. No 
one doubts that he was a great man. But what was he 
as a King and a shepherd of mankind? That is another 
matter." The portrait of Frederick II is famous; it 
dominates the book and has survived it. Was it, then, not 
written by Mirabeau after all ? The truth seems to be that 
the groundwork of the picture was painted by Mauvillon, 
but that Mirabeau rehandled it with the opulence of his 
own palette, gave it colour, animation — life. Moreover, 
in recounting the effect produced by the death of this great 
King he quotes from himself, borrowing textually several 
phrases from the letter which he wrote to Talleyrand 
during his mission. "All was gloom, but no one was 
sad; all was business, but no one was afflicted. There was 
not a single regret, not a single sigh, not one panegyric ! 
Such was to be the end of so many victories, so much 
glory, a reign of nearly half a century filled with a multi- 
tude of prodigies ! " And he adds, "They were weary of 
him even to hatred." 

This conciseness, which reminds one of Tacitus or 
Saint-Simon, is quite admirable and is characteristic of 
Mirabeau at his best. I agree also that "part of the intro- 
duction, the general arrangement, and the philosophical 

132 



APPROACH OF THE REVOLUTION 

and political generalizations," and the conclusion are to 
be attributed to him either because they are in harmony 
with his views, or because of their oratorical form. It will 
always, however, be impossible to get any exact or just idea 
of the respective contributions of Major Mauvillon and 
Mirabeau. This matters little : the "enormous compila- 
tion " had an incontestable value in its day, but it is now 
neither interesting nor profitable to the reader. The title 
alone remains, and that because it has a share in the name 
and fame of Mirabeau. 

After a perilous crossing from Berlin to Hamburg, 
Mirabeau reached Paris towards the end of September 
1787. The situation was grave. Calonne, ill qualified to 
resume the reforms of Turgot and to put an end to the 
abuses which more than any one he had helped to develop, 
had succumbed under the weight of his contradictions and 
his errors. The Denonciation de I' Agiotage had had 
something to do with his dismissal. His successor, 
Lomenie de Brienne, Archbishop of Toulouse, had been 
struggling for the previous five months with difficulties 
which he had not had the courage to face. The opponent 
of Calonne before the Assembly of Notables, he had at first 
given great hopes to the supporters of reform. In May 
1787 Mirabeau welcomed him as "a man of great talent 
and consequence." At the beginning of October La 
Fayette still trusted him in spite of the mistakes he had 
made. The indecision of his character, the uncertainty 
of his views, his alternations of slackness and violence 
had, however, proved his irremediable weakness and im- 
potence. His maladroitness, aggravated by infatuation, 
had restored the credit of the Parlement of Paris in public 
opinion to an unforeseen extent, and that body cleverly 
and boldly used this accession of popularity to reject 
unpopular taxation and to demand States-General, for 
which there was now a universal clamour covering very 
different projects. 

133 



MIRABEAU 

The Parlement having been dismissed to Troyes and 
then recalled, was asked to register a loan of four hundred 
and twenty millions, spread over a period of five years, 
subject to a promise that the States-General which had 
been demanded would at the same time be convoked. 
Mirabeau quite saw the necessity for a loan, without which, 
as he wrote to Soufflot de Merey, M. de Brienne's head 
clerk, "You can neither go on or, indeed, see the year 
out." When he wrote this letter, shortly after his return 
from Germany, and no doubt at the beginning of October, 
he was in the same state of mind which made him beg 
the Abbe de Perigord in the preceding year to give him 
employment for his activities. He now addressed himself 
to M. de Montmorin, Minister of Foreign Affairs, "offer- 
ing himself purely and simply," but expressing a prefer- 
ence for the "executive life," to which, he said, not with- 
out reason, he was more suited than to a speculative 
existence. Warsaw, St. Petersburg, Constantinople, Alex- 
andria, any of these would suit him, provided that he could 
enter a career to which he thought that his name, his travel, 
"his knowledge and his facility of work" gave him some 
right to aspire. 

The reception accorded to him by M. de Montmorin 
had led him to hope that this benefactor would "restore 
him to the life that was natural to him and set him in his 
true light." How was this to be done? It was for the 
Minister to determine both the nature of the employment 
and the remuneration. "I need nothing but what I shall 
earn. You alone, therefore, know what I should be paid, 
for you alone know how you can make use of me if I 
have the happiness to be employed." He explained that 
the bad health of "his most interesting companion," a 
secretary and "an indispensable establishment" cost him 
a lot of money. In these circumstances he left it to the 
Count to decide, but he wrapped up his desires in the most 
skilful precautions. "A fixed allowance on which I could 

134 



APPROACH OF THE REVOLUTION 

count, and which I should never exceed by a sou, would 
reduce my expenses all the more easily as I am, if not 
economical, at least moderate." 

With Lomenie de Brienne he was more reserved. He 
did not conceal how much he had been "attracted and 
charmed by the circumstances which promised an era of 
hope for his country." But he would not "ask for the 
confidence of a man to whom he had not yet given his 
own," or offer his services to one "whose plans were not 
known to or approved by him." The conduct of the 
department of the Controller-General of the Finances was 
not reassuring. He did not approve of the technical con- 
ditions under which some "old professors " were preparing 
the loan, whose political conditions he criticized a few 
weeks later. The autograph drafts still survive, dated 
November lo and i8 respectively, of two letters containing 
directions and advice which he addressed to a magistrate 
of the Parlement. The crisis was becoming acute. What 
was the Parlement about to do ? Would it accept an im- 
mediate final comprehensive loan with the promise that 
the States-General would meet before 1792, or by refusing 
registration would it commence a struggle with the 
Minister and resume the hostilities interrupted by the 
recall from Troyes ? Mirabeau held to his demand that 
the States-General should meet, not in 1792, but in 1789, 
and it was of this that he was endeavouring to persuade 
his correspondent. 

These letters are the true beginning of his political 
career and of his participation in public affairs, which, 
however, was still indirect. Luminous, pressing, decisive, 
they display a maturity of mind, a firmness of reasoning 
and an insight which are really remarkable. In them 
Mirabeau's genius, compact of passion and of reflection, 
of vehemence and policy, of boldness and moderation, is 
manifest and commanding. He does not suffer from the 
" terrible malady " with which he was later to reproach 

135 



MIRABEAU 

Ministers, "of never being able to make up his mind to 
do to-day what he will infallibly be compelled to do 
to-morrow." He knows what he wants and he will have it. 
Why adjourn the convocation of the States-General to a 
date at once distant and uncertain which inspired no con- 
fidence in good citizens? "If the force of circumstances 
make 1789 inevitable, why not ask for 1789? The state 
of the nation is too^ critical to allow those who are respons- 
ible for it another sixty months of expedients, or to permit 
them to borrow five or six hundred millions to cover a 
useless interval. For this mobile country a lustre is equiva- 
lent to a whole age. . . . The century is too far advanced, 
the ferment in men's minds is too great to allow us to lose 
anything of what we have acquired." 

On the eve of the return of the Parlement to Paris he 
returns to the charge. He has been reproached with con- 
tradicting himself in the course of a month by urging his 
friend the magistrate to oppose a loan, the necessity of 
which he had admitted in his letter to Soufilot de Merey. 
The reproach is unjust. He combated not the loan, but 
the absence of guarantees in the scheme proposed by the 
Archbishop of Toulouse. According to him it would be 
to dishonour oneself gratuitously, and to do a thing im- 
possible for an honest man, to register a loan of five 
hundred million "merely in return for a vague promise 
made in a disingenuous form of words, that States-General 
would be convoked before five years were over." That 
would be to give everything and to risk getting nothing 
in return. He advised his friend to agree to a loan of a 
hundred and twenty millions only, and that in return for 
a promise that the States-General would meet in 1789. 
Any other attitude would be a betrayal. To take the part 
of the minority against the country promised more risk 
than advantage. "The time is past," he concluded, "when 
any individual had the power to compensate a man for 
loss of public esteem, and the time is coming when the 

136 



APPROACH OF THE REVOLUTION 

suffrage of the nation will be enough to make any able man 
a citizen of great consequence." 

On November 19, after the debate in the Parlement and 
before the voting took place, Lamoignon, the Keeper of 
the Seals, turned to the King, took his commands and 
declared that the edicts were registered. This was a 
coup d'etat and an arbitrary action. Mirabeau was indig- 
nant. To the Due d'Orl^ans, who protested against the 
illegality of the measure, he sent an expression of con- 
gratulation and admiration. But a protest which was to 
be followed by exile did not solve the difficulties of a 
situation which was big with consequences. It was 
necessary to act. But how, with whom, by what means? 
Mirabeau was no more than an ordinary citizen. He had 
neither rank nor place, but the times had moved, and to 
prevent the crime which was in preparation, to spare his 
country the humiliation of a dishonourable bankruptcy, 
he found in his right as a citizen a sufficient authority. 
He did not wish to remain silent amid the desolation of 
France. There v;as in the Ministry "an honest man," 
M. de Montmorin, on whose influence with the King he 
counted. He addressed himself to him, and I do not know 
that he ever surpassed the heights to which his patriotism 
raised him at that time. 

His letter to the Minister, dated November 20, was 
written at a sitting almost without a correction. It welled 
forth, spontaneous, vigorous and moving, from the depths 
of his mind and heart. Is it a letter, or is it a speech ? 
Like all his happiest inspirations it is oratorical in form, 
it is composed rather to be spoken than read, and few 
phrases would require to be altered in order to transform 
it into a harangue hurled from the tribune to excite not 
the conscience of a timid Minister, but the unchained 
passions of a great assembly. It is not overloaded with 
useless detail. It is a reply, and without exordium or 
preamble it goes straight to the point. "The loan is 

137 



MIRABEAU 

rejected : it could not be otherwise." What is to be done? 
Are payments to be suspended, or is the debt to be cut 
down? Are we to forget "that the bare word of a king 
should be worth more than the oath of another man " ? 
Against . this baseness, this policy worthy of Caligula, 
which will end in ruin and "reduce 200,000 citizens to the 
execrable alternative of days of hunger or living on the 
proceeds of crime," the orator heaps up reasons, shows 
the moral and material impossibility of the measure, and 
how "the remorse of having initiated it will be followed 
by the shame of being compelled to abandon it." What 
then is to be done? "They must proclaim in precise and 
solemn terms the assembly in 1789 of States-General 
which are now inevitable." To postpone them is to leave 
everything in stagnation or anarchy, to provoke violent 
seditions. To prepare and announce them willingly is to 
give the King "the best year of his life." His Majesty's 
advisers had only two courses to put before him — "a crime 
which was infinitely dangerous, and an act of benevolence 
which was indispensably necessary. Could they hesitate 
between the two ? Could they compare the advantages of 
the alternative plans ? " To this vehement adjuration 
Mirabeau added a terrible prophecy. "I ask if you have 
reckoned with the convulsive energy of hunger on the 
genius of despair. I ask who will dare to make himself 
responsible for the consequences for the safety of all who 
surround the throne, nay, of the King himself ? . . ." He 
implores the Minister to make up his mind in conscience 
and wisdom to speak out, and if he is not understood to 
resign, in order to spare himself the reproach of "having 
assisted at the debate which decreed the shame of France. 
There are moments when courage is prudence, when 
temporizing is a crime and silence a dishonour ! " 

The convocation of States-General seemed to Mirabeau 
to be the only way of pacifying the anger and disappoint- 
ment which were abroad. The mere words States-General 

138 



APPROACH OF THE REVOLUTION 

in lySg must necessarily, according to him, bring back 
confidence and credit to a country of whose immense 
resources and profound vitaHty he was well aware. In 
the month of April, replying to an appeal from Dutch 
patriots, he had already proclaimed that "the first moments 
of the convalescence of France will be as good as the health 
of her neighbours." At the same time, about three days 
later, having written to M. de Montmorin, he dissipated 
the preconceived ideas of his friend Mauvillon. "France," 
he said, "has never been intrinsically stronger and 
healthier, never nearer to developing her full stature. 
There is nothing wrong here but the temporary embarrass- 
ment of an unsystematic administration, and the absurd 
fear of appealing to the nation f6r national reconstruction." 

The Ministers were, in fact, obsessed by this fear, and 
M. de Montmorin remained deaf to Mirabeau's appeals. 
Seven months were still to elapse, full of abortive efforts, 
violence and disturbances, before Lomeniie de Brienne 
could make up his mind, under the pressure of events in 
Brittany and Dauphine and under the menaces of the 
Grand Council itself, to convoke the States-General on 
August 12, 1788, for 1789. 

Under the title Analyse des papiers anglais, Mirabeau, 
with Clavi^re and Brissot, had founded in 1787 a journal 
chiefly devoted to foreign politics, but dealing also to 
some extent with constitutional problems and domestic 
events. This publication gave him an opportunity of 
affirming his independence of the Government with a 
pride the accents of which one regrets not to be able to 
admire more frequently. M. de Montmorin had disap- 
proved of a polemic in which the Analyse was engaged 
with Mallet du Pan, who edited the Mercure de France. 
"Allow me, M. le Comte, in pursuance of my engagement 
not to give the slightest umbrage to Government, to support 
its views when they are in conformity with my principles, 
and to abstain from comment when I cannot approve of 

139 



MIRABEAU 

its proceedings. I persevere in my own way and my own 
plan, and pay no more heed to the clamours of Mallet and 
Panckoucke than to the buzzing of the insects that fly 
around me." 

Mirabeau continued to preach the convocation, "ever 
more necessary, more pressing and more infallible," of 
States-General, to which it is remarkable that, as early as 
April 1788, he gave the name of National Assembly, 

It was at this time that Lamoignon and M. de Mont- 
morin asked him to publish a pamphlet against the Parle- 
ments, whose hostility was becoming more and more 
formidable. He at first refused to perform the task. The 
letter he wrote to M. de Montmorin on April 18, to explain 
the reasons for his refusal, does as much honour to his 
courage as to his insight. His attitude is concentrated in 
a phrase, " I shall never make war on the Parlements except 
in the presence of the nation. When the nation, united 
and constituted, has given itself a constitution it will be 
time to recall the Parlements to their judicial functions, 
to deprive them of the privileges they have usurped, to 
put an end to their intrigues and their foolish provocations. 
In the meantime we must maintain the only bodies which 
have preserved the means of compounding with the terrible 
will of a single man." Precipitation would necessarily 
be suspicious. "If you take from the nation the phantom 
which it has long regarded as the protector of its rights 
without calling upon it to protect and exercise them itself, 
men will not believe that you are repressing the ambition 
of the Parlements in order to give the kingdom a constitu- 
tion. They will think they are on the way to absolute 
'despotism, to entirely arbitrary government." Let the 
Government convoke States-General and thereby calm the 
impatience of good citizens and recover their confidence. 
It will then avoid the "menace of an insurrection, the con- 
sequences of which it is not given to human wisdom to 
measure," and it will deprive all turbulent men and 

140 



APPROACH OF THE REVOLUTION 

organizations of all pretext for raising a storm before the 
meeting of the National Assembly. No, "the moment for 
waging a wordy war against the Parlements is not yet 
come." Mirabeau refuses on the ground that he did not 
wish to throw himself into a doubtful cause, the object 
of which is uncertain, the principle doubtful, and the pro- 
gress dark and terrifying." It would be impossible to 
find a stronger combination of personal dignity and 
political common sense. 

Three weeks later appeared the Reponse aux alarmes des 
bon citoyens, an anonymous pamphlet which was a formal 
denunciation of the Parlements, attacking their encroach- 
ments, their abuses and their privileges, the scandal of 
their legislative pretensions, their venality and their 
hereditary offices. The author of this pamphlet was Mira- 
beau ! One would be glad to doubt it, but he has himself 
admitted that if he did not write it all, his pen "traced 
all that was theoretical and effective in it." What is the 
secret of such a remarkably rapid evolution ? Must we 
again entertain the terrible suspicion of bribery and 
corruption which stains so many of the actions and the 
writings of Mirabeau ? I cannot deny the contradiction 
which remains painful and disconcerting, but I think it 
right to reduce it to its exact proportions. 

Mirabeau was at bottom anything but favourable to 
the bonnets carres, whose opposition to Turgot's reforms 
he had not forgotten. He had endured but had not 
approved "the inconceivable situation which had made 
France parliamentary." He did not love the Parlements, 
and he did not defend them for their own sake, but only 
as against the despotism in which an unprecedented con- 
course of circumstances had made them its adversaries in 
the eyes of the nation. They were in his view the transi- 
tion, unexpected, doubtless, but inevitable, to the States- 
General which he demanded. His book points to these 
very States-General as "necessarily and prescriptively the 

141 



MIRABEAU 

supreme legislator which should periodically possess all 
sovereign rights." In order to "make the state of the 
nation tolerable and to prepare it at no distant date for a 
splendid future, he expected the States-General to discuss 
taxation, economy, the abolition of privileges, the suppres- 
sion of lettres de cachet, the freedom of the press. In 
this programme he was consistent with himself. But even 
though he escapes the reproach of repudiating his own 
views, he had none the less made a mistake in publishing 
a book which his friend the Due de Lauzun blamed for 
having destroyed for the benefit of people who did not 
wish to rebuild. This reproach was difficult to refute. 

By a fatality which Mirabeau could not foresee, the 
pamphlet appeared immediately after the execution of the 
violent measures against the Parlement : the arrest of 
D'Epremesnil, the constitution of the Cour pleniere. If 
it had not prepared this violence it appeared to justify it, 
though Mirabeau regarded the surrounding of the Palace as 
a proceeding both stupid and odious. Events bore out the 
wise warnings contained in the letter to M. de Montmorin, 
and Mirabeau himself returned to the actual terms of the 
letter, three months afterwards, in a continuation of the 
Denonciation de V Agiotage, reproducing textually the most 
important passages. He admitted that the Minister who 
had destroyed the Parlements without giving the nation the 
guarantee of a constitution had made a mistake. He 
demanded a constitution once more as "the basis of all 
economy, of all resources, of all confidence, of all power." 
When the Minister at last decided, on August 8, to convoke 
the States-General, Mirabeau exclaimed that the nation 
had stepped forward a century in twenty-four hours. He 
was patriotic enough to rejoice for the sake of the interests^ 
of the country, for which he saw the promise of a new 
destiny. 'But it cannot be doubted that he also felt a pro- 
found personal satisfaction. When, in November 1787, 
he wrote to M. de Montmorin, "The day will come when 

142 



APPROACH OF THE REVOLUTION 

the suffrage of the nation will be enough to make a good 
citizen a man of great consideration," one may wonder 
whether he was referring to the Minister or to himself. 
Now there is no longer any room for doubt. He 
unburdens himself to Mauvillon of his joyous confidence. 
"Ah, my friend, you will see what sort of a nation this 
will be when it has its constitution, when talent also will 
be a power in the land. I hope that when the time comes 
you will hear good news of your friend." 

The hour was, in fact, at hand when he was about to 
enter on the active and glorious phase of his career. Un- 
happily the admirable woman who, with disinterested love, 
had for the past four years shared his troubles and his 
labours, who had encouraged, sustained and restored him 
to himself, was almost at the very same moment driven 
out of his life by his own evil conduct. In July 1787, 
writing from Brunswick, he said, "Ah, Henriette, if ever 
an evil genius came between us, if it were possible that 
you should ever leave me to my fate, I might seek distrac- 
tion in the whirlwind of pleasure, but I should not find 
happiness there, and it would soon be the death of 
me. . . ." The "evil genius" soon came on the scene. 
The projected publication of the Monarchie prussienne 
had brought Mirabeau into touch with the bookseller 
Lejay. Mme. Lejay, a pretty, vicious and intriguing 
woman, was not long in acquiring an ascendency over him 
which, as Dumont tells us in his Souvenirs, "she used 
only to excite his natural violence and to serve her own 
interests. His friends blushed to see him the slave of a 
woman whose disorderly life was not redeemed by a single 
good quality." Mme. Lejay was passionate, perfidious 
and cruel ; she was jealous of Mme. de Nehra, and wished 
to be the sole possessor of Mirabeau 's affections. She 
therefore did her best to irritate and excite her lover 
against her rival, and she succeeded only too well. Mira- 
beau, being entirely in the wrong, had constant scenes 

143 



MIRABEAU 

with Mme. de Nehra, passing from violence to repentance, 
from fury to tears, from reproaches to excuses. He cursed 
the new woman who was troubhng his existence, but the 
terrible "physical frenzy," the family affliction which his 
father had so often noted in him, always unfailingly 
brought him back to her. Feeling that their common life 
was becoming intolerable, Mme. de Nehra sacrificed herself 
and left him. Mirabeau judged her truly when he wrote, 
"You have a just and wise intelligence, the address of a 
woman and the sense of a man." When he lost her he 
lost more than a friend. When his good genius left him 
there departed also a part of his conscience, and it was 
not long before the evil genius who entirely took her place 
inspired him to commit one of the worst actions in his 
tempestuous life. 

While this calamity (no other word would be appro- 
priate) was overtaking his private life, he was being more 
and more drawn to public affairs. Proposals that he 
should become a candidate for the States-General had 
been made to him from Alsace. This may have been the 
occasion of a letter which he wrote on August i6, 1788, to 
Levrault, the Strasbourg bookseller. None of his writings 
better indicates both his feeling about the political situa- 
tion, his personal opinions and the incomparable clairvoy- 
ance of his genius. He was well aware that the first 
States-General "would do many foolish things," but his 
confidence in a legal constitution remained unimpaired. 
His view was that it would be a mistake to attempt too 
much. His immediate programme was summed up under 
three main heads — taxation by consent of the nation, civil 
liberty, and periodical assemblies. His mottO' was, "No 
quarter to privileges and the privileged." He repudiated 
any violent revolution, and built hopes on education and 
on a free press, which events after his death cruelly disap- 
pointed. He advocated a numerous assembly, but thought 
that five or six men of ability would be enough to "con- 

144 



APPROACH OF THE REVOLUTION 

trol the crowd." He may have foreseen his own destiny 
and the judgment of history when he added, "Without 
corruption (for those who can be corrupted are never 
worth corrupting) the Government should make sure of 
these five or six men." There can be no doubt that he 
reckoned himself as one of them. 

But who would open the doors of the States-General to 
him ? Alsace "jilted" him, as he put it, and he turned his 
thoughts to Provence, where his lawsuit had earned for 
him a popular triumph not yet forgotten. Here, how- 
ever, he required the support and countenance of his 
father. What would the Marquis say and do ? For five 
years all relations had been at an end between them, but 
the old man had been following the career of his son, 
whose talent he recognized, however much he deplored 
his lack of character, judgment and honesty. During the 
last few months, however, his views had been less severe. 
He realized that events suited to his capacity were about 
to give him a chance ; but what part was he to play ? " If 
this gentleman," he wrote, "wished to make a figure in the 
nation he would do well to return to his native province. 
There, where he is well known, his labours and his talent 
would give him weight as a member of the Assembly. 
His father, whose one desire is peace and quietness, has 
nothing to do with all this." The old Marquis was quite 
right in the main, but he was mistaken about his own 
influence on this decisive phase in his son's career. He 
knew that Mirabeau was a friend of the Ministers and was 
in close touch with M. de Lamoignon and M. de Mont- 
morin. He had been vaguely sounded on the subject of 
his relations with Mirabeau, but had given evasive answers. 
In the name of M. de Montmorin, the Bishop of Blois, 
M. de Themines, in due course made more definite over- 
tures, and in order to secure his father's goodwill even 
more completely, Mirabeau appealed to the Bailli. He 
had behaved badly to his uncle after the Aix case, in 

L 145 



MIRABEAU 

which he had been so much helped by his l^indness; but 
the Bailli, with his usual goodness of heart, had forgiven 
him. At the instance of the Bishop the Marquis was 
already disposed to receive his son, but only "in order 
that he might say that he had done so," and not to injure 
his chances. The Marquis still refused to be told anything 
about his son's plans and intentions. This was not much, 
but it was enough ; and Mirabeau soon enlarged the narrow 
opening before him. The dedication of the Monarchie 
prussienne, with its respectful admiration, appealed to the 
Marquis as a kind of amende honorable^ and though he 
realized the defects of the huge book, he was astonished 
by the great amount of labour and talent which it con- 
tained. A long letter, dated October 4, completed the con- 
quest. In it Mirabeau replied, point by point, to all his 
father's reproaches, and defended himself above all against 
the charge that his pen was venal. "When have I argued 
on both sides of a case ? That is the essential character- 
istic of a hireling pen." He explained his relations with 
Calonne, the conditions of his mission to Berlin, and the 
disinterested relations he had had with M. de Lamoignon. 
These explanations were adroit, and to all appearance pre- 
cise enough to produce a good impression on the Marquis. 
But how much more must he have been touched by the 
deference with which his son offered to retire in his favour 
if his health permitted him to appear at the States-General ? 
"You will make a great sensation there," insinuates Mira- 
beau, "and your day of glory will be a day of pride for 
our family." It is only if his father cannot come forward, 
and in order that "estates so considerable as ours should 
have their representative," that he solicits the honour of 
election. This letter had its effect. The Marquis had retired 
to Argenteuil, and was resting at a house to which he at 
first refused access to his son, but he ended by summoning 
him thither. The interview was ceremonious. The author 
of the Ami des Homynes lectured the author of the Mori" 

146 




THE MARQUIS DE MIRABEAU 
{From a drawing in the Paul Arband collection at Aix) 



APPROACH OF THE REVOLUTION 

archie prussienne on the philosophical and anti-religious 
affectations of his book. Mirabeau was deferential and 
conciliatory. "You know well," wrote the Marquis to 
the Bailli, "how good he is at agreeing with everything 
one wants." On that day he agreed to everything with even 
more docility than usual. He gained his point, and did 
not think that his success was too dearly purchased at the 
price of having to endure respectfully an economic sermon. 
M. de Montmorin, in taking action with the Marquis 
to facilitate a reconciliation, had done Mirabeau a great 
service. It was enough to make him hope and ask for 
more. It was thought probable that the rules of the elec- 
tion would require that candidates should produce proof 
of territorial status, and as he could not be sure that his 
negotiations in Provence would succeed, Mirabeau had 
acquired a small estate in Dauphine. The transaction 
was a fictitious one, but it had cost a considerable sum, 
and on November lo, in addition to the balance of the 
price, he had tO' pay the expenses, which amounted to 
4800 francs. Mirabeau, encouraged by the kindness of 
the Due de Lauzun, begged him to do his best with the 
Minister for Foreign Affairs. "M. de Montmorin," he 
wrote, '"has often told me to regard him as my banker, 
and since the small sum which you were good enough to 
extort from him for me I have not had a sou of his money, 
or any other money of any kind from the Government; 
you will believe my word of honour rather than treacherous 
and absurd gossip. ... It would be a great thing for me 
if he could arrange to have this sum lent to me, and in 
truth I think he might make a worse use of the King's 
money." On the 14th he emphasized the extreme urgency 
of the matter, and pointed out that it was his only chance 
of becoming a member of the States-General. But, this 
time at least, though he promised to be grateful, he reserved 
with proper dignity his political liberty of action. "I 
beg you," he wrote, "to make any engagements on my 

147 



MIRABEAU 

behalf with M. de Montmorin which you would yourself 
undertake in my position, and no others. I can promise 
to spare individuals, but I cannot promise to respect or 
conciliate any principles than my own." Two days later 
Mirabeau reported a conversation he had had with M. de 
Montmorin. The Minister, who seemed to have a "real 
desire to see him in the States-General," and who had 
decided "to take steps to get him some pecuniary assist- 
ance in order to help him to enter the National Assembly," 
gave him an appointment for a date subsequent to the fatal 
settling day. Of this settling day Mirabeau, "with a 
delicacy which may or may not have been misplaced," 
had been unwilling to speak, and he again begged the 
Due de Lauzun to do what he could for him. "Do me 
this service, M. le Due," he wrote. "If to the 4800 francs 
for the estate they could add 100 or 150 louis at least, 
whether for my travelling expenses to the province where 
my election will be carried on, or for the entertainment of 
the electors, they will complete the load of obligation under 
which they will place me. I have spoken of two or three 
thousand crowns. Go further if you think it possible, M. 
le Due. I confess that 500 louis would give me great 
pleasure, but it is absolutely necessary that I should have 
4800 francs for the 20th." What was the result of this 
"trepan" (the word is Mirabeau's own) is not clear. It 
does not seem that the Minister granted his request, as on 
December 17 Mirabeau wrote, "If he really makes an effort 
this time, let it be decisive and not abortive," and on the 
23rd he was again urging M. de Lauzun to further 
zealous and friendly activities. "If M. de Montmorin 
knew half the trouble to which he is condemning me he 
would arrange with his good friend Necker that some 
crumbs from the Treasury might fall at the Ministry of 
Foreign Affairs. . . . What a fatality it is that we who 
are worth more than they should lack the one power which 
is really decisive at the present moment — the power of 

148 



APPROACH OF THE REVOLUTION 

money ! Ah, Monsieur le Due, let us at any cost be in 
the States-General; we shall lead them — and we shall do 
great things, and have great joys worth more than the 
playthings of a court ! " 

Alas, it was indeed "at any cost" that Mirabeau wished 
to be a member of the States-General. I have before me 
the originals of these letters, which show that he was 
bankrupt in another than the material sense. The writing 
is clear, composed and without erasure. Must we believe 
that his incessant need of money had obliterated in him 
the moral sense to such a degree that he did not feel that 
these obsequious appeals lowered his dignity and his 
proper pride? For his honour one would be glad not to 
know of these documents, but knowing them one cannot 
suppress them without treachery to the truth of history. 
They reveal once again, and not for the last time, the 
secret vice, the incurable taint, the deplorable want of 
conscience which characterized him. But is it Mirabeau 
alone who stands condemned? On January i6 Chateau- 
briand, on his way to Berlin as Louis XVIII's ambassador, 
was amusing himself on the journey by re-reading the 
Correspondance secrete, and from Mayence he wrote to 
Mme. de Duras, "I have been struck with one thing, and 
that is the frivolity and incapacity of a Government who 
had under their eyes the correspondence of such a man 
and could not guess what he was." 

The publication of this Correspondence, which, accord- 
ing to Chateaubriand, ought to have opened up a diplo- 
matic career for Mirabeau, was deplorable, and imperilled 
his chance of becoming a member of the States-General. 
Under the title of Histoire secrete de la cour de Berlin, 
Mirabeau 's letters to the Abbe de P^rigord in 1786 and 
1787 appeared in two stout volumes in January 1789. 
The scandal was increased by the fact that Prince Henry, 
who was much mishandled in the book, was at the very 
moment of publication the guest of the French Government. 

149 



MIRABEAU 

"It is perhaps," says the Correspondence of Grimm and 
Diderot, "the most inconceivable and audacious libel that 
any one has ever dared to publish. We mention it here 
only in order to hold it up to universal indignation." The 
Berlin Government were offended and complained, and 
the Minister, forced to act, reported the book to the Parle- 
ment, by which on February lo it was ordered to be 
destroyed as "a defamatory and calumnious libel as con- 
trary to the respect due to a friendly Power as to the law 
of nations and to public international law." The printing 
and sale of the book were forbidden, and the sentence 
ordered that an information should be laid against the 
author, publisher and printer. The printer was repri- 
manded, but the author was neither pursued nor disturbed. 
Public opinion and the circumstances pointed to Mira- 
beau. He was busy with his campaign in Provence; he 
was astonished by the hue and cry which he had not 
expected, and by the indignation aroused, the severity of 
which was in sharp contrast to the manners of the period, 
and was, in fact, surprising. He therefore jested and 
argued about the publication, and even denied it in a series 
of letters, public and private, which deceived no one. He 
was, in truth, allowing the storm to pass, persuaded that "it 
is rash to use, the words ' always ' and ' never ' with the 
public, and especially with the French public." After 
his triumphant return he thought himself invulnerable, 
and took a higher tone ; but the gravity of the indiscretion 
and his audacious and lying denials of it had struck a 
serious blow at his credit. 

It was bad enough to have published his Lettres a 
Cerutti, in which Mirabeau renewed and aggravated his 
violent attacks on Necker at the very time when he was 
soliciting pecuniary assistance from the Government of 
which Necker was the head. In that case he was making 
use of a private correspondence in which the answers to 
his letters, at least, were not his property. But the Berlin 

150 



APPROACH OF THE REVOLUTION 

correspondence had a totally different character, it was 
diplomatic in essence and in origin ; it dealt with princes 
and ambassadors, and was the exclusive property of the 
Government to which it was addressed, and which had 
deciphered it and paid for it. Its publication exposed 
France to the risk of the gravest complications, and 
involved responsibilities the nature and extent of which 
Mirabeau knew better than any one. He has been accused 
of having been paid by M. de Montmorin under the 
double condition that he would not publish it and would 
not present himself at the States-General. His letter to 
the Due de Lauzun and the letters of M. de Montmorin 
are sufficient to show that this is unfounded. The truth 
is that, having "bill transactions" with the Lejay house- 
hold, he was in pressing need of money. When he begged 
the Due de Lauzun to extort something from M. de Mont- 
morin he said to him, " If you succeed, you will be so kind 
as to remit this sum to Messrs. Lejay, to whom I have given 
directions about it?" This is almost a confession. On 
the other hand, he required a large sum of money for 
election purposes, and the Histoire secrete furnished what 
he wanted. When Mme. de Nehra left him she observed, 
"You are in execrable hands," and this observation was 
prophetic. 



151 



CHAPTER X 

THE ELECTIONS IN PROVENCE 

Mirabeau, the Noblesse and the Tiers £itat : First manifestations ot 
Mirabeau's oratorical powers — The disturbances at Marseilles and at 
Aix : Mirabeau as peacemaker — The election at Aix. 

Mirabeau, after a journey in the course of which he had 
been able to appreciate the extent of the distress caused 
by an exceptionally rigorous winter, arrived at Aix on 
January 15, 1789. The Municipal Council of Aix in the 
name of the ancient privilege of Provence had protested 
against the terms of the convocation of the States. It had 
been decided at a meeting called by the Council to petition 
his Majesty very humbly, "to summon forthwith a general 
assembly of the three orders of the country, both to deter- 
mine the composition of the States of the province, the 
number of deputies of each order, and the rules thereunto 
relating, and to give these deputies the requisite in- 
structions." The request for a general assembly of the 
three orders dominated all the rest. The Tiers Etat of 
Provence, which had declared in advance that it would 
consider null and void all deliberations not held in this 
form, was not associated with the petition. 

Mirabeau, convoked by the syndics of the landed pro- 
prietors, sat in the States of the Nobility where he had 
already voted sixteen years before. Whether by policy 
or from pride in his rank as a gentleman unwilling to 
abdicate his rights and titles, it was to his own order that 
he first addressed himself, without, however, losing sight of 
the Tiers fitat, in which he felt that he would find his base 
of operations, his influence and his power. The place he 

152 



THE ELECTIONS IN PROVENCE 

took in the procession preceding the opening of the States 
was significant. Portahs the younger records that he 
walked in a manner between the nobiUty and the Tiers 
Etat, and in the last rank of the nobility. The Tiers had 
received him with lively enthusiasm, but on the other hand 
he was made to feel that the Noblesse regarded him with 
concealed hatred and distrust. "I do not trouble myself 
about it," he wrote to his father, "but I let it be understood 
that if I am not noble, I have made up my mind to be 
bourgeois." On January 21, he combated energetically 
but unsuccessfully the protest against the rules of 1788, 
which was made by the nobility who were enraged by the 
doubling of the Tiers Etat. Incidentally he alluded to the 
vote by heads, the principle of which he admitted, 
demanding whether Provence could evade what was the 
common law of the realm. 

On January 23, he spoke again. A rule of 1620 had 
been cited in order to insist that any one claiming to sit 
in the States' of the Nobility must be the possessor of a fief. 
This meant the exclusion of Mirabeau, who at once began 
to prepare himself for the emergency. He was skilful 
enough not to seem to be on his guard, and took the line 
of pleading the general cause of those nobles whom such 
a decision would cast out of all the orders, and who could 
be neither electors nor capable of being elected, neither 
representatives nor represented. Those who violated the 
principles of justice by proposing to act in this way "would 
be acting against their own interests, for it was not for 
those who set themselves up to resist the millions belong- 
ing to the Tiers Etat to cut themselves off from their 
equals." He was defeated as he had been before, but he 
carried with him an important minority; and he was 
justified in considering his defeat to be "a signal victory 
in a servile assembly in which hitherto no speech had 
been heard beyond the words ' I agree with Messieurs 
les Syndics.' " 

153 



MIRABEAU 

If he regarded the Noblesse "as an ignorant, rapacious 
and insolent body " he was under no illusion as to the 
energy to be expected of the Tiers Etat. Those who com- 
posed it were connected with the administration by personal 
ties which embarrassed and weakened their action. They 
were without "enlightenment and without a plan," and 
they made but a faint resistance to the intrigues and the 
suggestions of the privileged classes. Mirabeau summed 
up the situation in a profound and admirable saying, 
borrowed from Tacitus, which he was fond of quoting : 
"Voluntary servitude makes more tyrants than tyranny 
itself makes involuntary slaves." 

In the circumstances he determined to bring things to 
a head by contesting the legality of the States of Provence 
as then constituted. He did so in a moderate and precise 
speech, the argument of which, while necessarily somewhat 
theoretical and abstract, was full of life and power. He 
could not admit that "the two orders who are not the 
nation should prevail over the nation," and he demanded 
a general convocation of the three orders as the Com- 
munes of Provence in 1788 and the Municipal Council of 
Aix had done. 

In view of the disagreement which persisted in the States 
and the agitation of public opinion which the discussion 
was beginning to arouse, the King's commissaries sus- 
pended the deliberations. This suspension prevented 
Mirabeau from replying at a sitting of the States to the 
protest which, on January 31, the orders of the clergy 
and the nobility entered on the minutes against his speech. 
This protest accused him of having prevented conciliation 
and of having affirmed opinions "subversive of public 
order and contrary to the authority of the King." He was 
not a man to endure in silence such an unfair reproach. 
On February 3 he printed his reply. It is more than 
famous : it is immortal. He revealed his full stature and 
came forward as the equal of the greatest orators of 

154 



THE ELECTIONS IN PROVENCE 

antiquity. He had produced the first of his masterpieces 
of political eloquence. There is nothing wanting in it 
and nothing excessive. With extraordinary adroitness he 
seized the opportunity so imprudently offered to him of 
identifying his personal grievances with the public interest. 
Against the insolence and awkwardness of the nobility, 
against the attitude of the clergy, always too skilful in 
protecting its privileges by appeals to the respect due to 
God and the King, he came forward as the representative 
of the indignant Tiers Etat. In him a new social order 
raises its head, angry and threatening. The whole spirit 
of the Revolution already appears in his language and his 
attitude. He speaks in the name of the People "who 
have but to stand still in order to be formidable to their 
enemies." He questions the honour of those who have 
attacked him : he summons them to explain themselves, 
and beyond the boundaries of Provence, beyond even the 
frontiers of France he takes to witness "an attentive 
Europe." 

Remembering that he was a patrician, he borrowed from 
history a scathing peroration which has lost nothing of its 
force or brilliancy or of its incomparable beauty, "In 
every country, in every age the aristocracy has implacably 
persecuted the friends of the People ; and if, by I know not 
what turn of fortune, such a friend has arisen from among 
their own number they have struck at him before all others 
in their longing to inspire terror by their choice of a 
victim. Thus perished the last of the Gracchi at the hands 
of the patricians ; but, though he received a mortal wound, 
he rose to heaven from the dust, calling down the avenging 
Gods. From this dust sprang Marius, Marius who was 
less great as the conqueror of the Cimbri than as the 
destroyer of the Roman aristocratic nobility." This 
evocation of the past was followed by a terrible predic- 
tion of the future. "Woe to the privileged orders, if 
indeed it is better to be the friend of the people than the 

155 



MIRABEAU 

friend of the nobility; for privileges will come to an end, 
but the people is eternal ! " He seems to have foreseen 
this decisive hour of his destiny. A few days after his 
arrival in Provence he wrote to his sister: "These people 
would make me Tribune of the People in spite of myself 
if I did not hold myself in with all my might." It may 
be doubted whether he really restrained himself as much 
as he professed : in any case his tribunate began from the 
date of his reply. 

It may well be supposed that after such a declaration 
of war, couched though it was in the form of a reply to a 
provocation, the Noblesse decided that the time was come 
and the pretext had arisen for the execution of the design 
which they had cherished since the meeting of the States 
began. On the proposition of the Marquis de La Fare, 
first consul of Aix, they decided on February 8 that Mira- 
beau, not having a title by reason of any property or 
possessions in Provence, should cease to be present at their 
sittings. It should be added that this decision was not 
unanimous, and that even among the nobles there were 
found wise and courageous men who denounced the 
illegality and imprudence of such measures. Forced by 
his "fatal destiny to be always obliged to do everything 
in twenty-four hours," Mirabeau published on the nth 
a Manifesto to the Provengal Nation. Though hastily 
composed this piece has nothing of the air of an improvisa- 
tion. For the exercise of his talent on general ideas Mira- 
beau required stimulation and collaboration, but in all that 
concerned himself, his life, his interests, his passions and 
his mind his spontaneity was incomparable The Manifesto 
has a movement, a logical cogency, an ironical quality which 
still command attention, so true it is that "egotism which 
belittles everything in private life has the power of giving 
greatness to all things in public affairs." Mirabeau missed 
none of the advantage given him by the self-contradiction 
of the Noblesse who had excluded him after admitting him 

156 



THE ELECTIONS IN PROVENCE 

and after deciding that his title was valid. He rallies 
M. de La Fare in a tone which recalls the Beaumarchais of 
the Memoires. "M. de La Fare," he says, "has, no doubt, 
confused the legitimation of my credentials with that of 
my opinions. He has taken the view that the right to 
reject a conclusion implied the right to reject its author." 
He unveils the unavowable purposes that lay behind his 
exclusion, and he appealed to the Provencal nation. But 
his political sense did not desert him, and he predicted 
that the hour was at hand when "France would have a 
single, homogeneous, stable and permanent constitution 
in exchange for which it would be profitable for every one 
to surrender local rights and pretensions." This was the 
echo of the debate in which some months earlier the States 
of Dauphine had proclaimed that the sacrifice of local 
prerogatives was the first that was called for in the interests 
of public liberty. Thus the unity of the nation was being 
prepared by the abandonment of all privileges. 

Meanwhile, however, the clamour aroused at Paris by 
the publication of the Histoire secrete de la cour de Berlin 
had not died away. Mirabeau's absence facilitated the 
manoeuvres of his adversaries, who were the more em- 
bittered as the echoes of the Provengal discussions were 
making it clear what were his powers and how great a 
part he was likely to play. At first he regarded all this as 
a passing impression which need not be taken seriously, 
but he ended by realizing the boldness of his enemies and 
the lukewarmness of his friends. He left for Paris on 
February 15 and saw Panchaud, the Due de Lauzun and 
the Due de Nemours. Talleyrand, enraged by the discredit 
which the revelations of his financial operations threatened 
to throw upon his career and his ambitions, absolutely 
refused to receive him. 

Mirabeau returned to Aix on March 6. On the way, 
at Lambesc and at Saint-Cannat, he was enabled to judge of 
his popularity. Thousands of people pressed round him 

157 



MIRABEAU 

with acclamations and stopped his carriage, he was received 
with peals of bells and discharges of fireworks. At Aix 
there was a delirium "of harangues, garlands, cries, 
embraces, skyrockets, drums, panpipes, deputations, illu- 
minations, an intoxication of joy and confidence." He was 
received as a deliverer and saluted as father of his country. 
What a change from the time, only six years previously, 
when in this very town he had endured the persecu- 
tions of usurers, the disdain of his wife, the insolence of 
the nobility, and the partiality of the judges. But though 
he was deeply moved he did not lose his head. A new 
Royal Regulation, while it did not fully satisfy the claims 
of the Tiers Etat of Provence, confirmed the doubled 
number of representatives and reserved the future for 
further consideration. Mirabeau published a pamphlet in 
which he wisely counselled a prompt and respectful acquies- 
cence "in order not to give the privileged classes a pretext 
for realizing their secret wish to evade altogether the 
holding of States-General." 

In order to increase his chances of election, and to pro- 
vide in case of necessity for a new candidature, he left for 
Marseilles. The scenes at Aix were renewed there with 
all the added brilliancy conferred by a hundred thousand 
voices "from the cabin-boy to the millionaire." 

Mirabeau had hardly left Marseilles when he was recalled 
thither by events. On March 23 a riot had broken out, 
provoked by the high price of bread and meat. The 
municipal authorities had been coerced by an armed 
mob into making a decree lowering prices so much that, 
had they continued at that figure, all the tradesmen 
in the town would have been ruined. The house of the 
intendant had been sacked and more serious troubles were 
feared. A certain lawyer named Bremont-Julien, basing 
his request on the admiration which he felt for Mirabeau, 
begged him to come to the help of the city. M. de 
Caraman, the military commander, was consulted, and left 

158 



THE ELECTIONS IN PROVENCE 

it to "Mirabeau's good feeling and ability to do what he 
could for the public good." On this the tribune could do 
no less than return to Marseilles, and he did not hesitate. 
At the risk of losing his popularity he bravely went where 
his duty called him. The riot had increased in volume. 
Foreigners whose object was pillage had mixed with the 
people who only wanted justice. Mirabeau, with the help 
of a band composed of young men, citizens and dock 
porters, organized unarmed patrols to re-establish and 
maintain order. This "citizen militia" purged the town 
of criminals. Delegates representing all the trades were 
added to the city council to inspire confidence. For four 
nights Mirabeau took no rest; he was everywhere and 
managed everything. The chief difficulty was to persuade 
the people, who wished to keep prices down even though they 
knew it would be disastrous. Mirabeau composed, printed, 
placarded and distributed from house to house an Avis 
au peuple Marseillais, the reading of which is pleasantly 
surprising. The giant speaks in tones of seductive 
geniality, with a simple familiarity and a lucidity which 
recalls the best pages of Franklin. He brings political 
economy, the laws of supply and demand, the mechanism 
of bread-making and the solidarity of interests within the 
grasp of the popular mind. He appeals to the reason of 
the people, and mingles flattery with persuasion. "All 
this will be changed," he said, "but it is agreed that it 
cannot all be changed in a day. ... I hope, therefore, 
that you will all say : * this price will do : it was just and 
necessary to raise it.' Every man will then be calm in 
order that others may be so, and your example will produce 
peace everywhere." 

For the time, at least, peace was re-established at 
Marseilles. But while Mirabeau was working there with 
a success worthy of his courage, disorder was brewing at 
Aix. There had been collisions between the military and 
the populace, and there had been killed and wounded on 

159 



MIRABEAU 

both sides. Looting of the granaries followed, and Mira- 
beau, being informed, left for Aix with all speed. M. de 
Caraman entrusted him with the duty of securing the 
safety of the town, the danger to which was aggravated 
by the fact that it was market day. In pursuance of the 
trust reposed in him, Mirabeau formed pickets of citizens, 
occupied the gates, went the round of the ports, harangued 
the crowd, put the people on their honour to keep the peace, 
turned back the traders who were coming in from the 
country, re-established the free circulation of grain, quelled 
the disorder and resisted with equal wisdom the nobles 
who wanted the people court-martialled and the people 
who wanted "some executions as an after-piece." 

Some days after these incidents Mirabeau was elected 
deputy by the Tiers Etat of Aix and by the Tiers fitat of 
Marseilles. On April 7 he decided to sit for Aix, but he 
went in person to thank the electors of Marseilles. He 
then left for Paris. His dream was realized ; he was a 
member of the States-General : his public life had begun. 



160 



CHAPTER XI 

MIRABEAU AT THE STATES-GENERAL 

An estimate of his mind — His political and religious ideas, his teaching 
and his experience — His venality — His overtures to M. de Montmorin. 

It may be asked what manner of man Mirabeau was, what 
were his ideas and what were his plans at the time when 
he appeared for the first time in the politics of his country, 
whose destinies he was to influence so profoundly, and 
what had been his preparation for the tremendous part 
which events compelled or permitted him to play. He 
was forty years of age, and throughout a dissipated and 
tempestuous life, punctuated with imprisonment and exile, 
his will had never wavered for a moment. He had always 
and everywhere worked with indefatigable tenacity to 
secure the means of living and learning. His early educa- 
tion had been hasty and imperfect ; he revised and com- 
pleted it. He read and translated the ancient authors; he 
learned modern languages; above all, he packed his mind 
with history. His memory was prodigious, and he was an 
indefatigable taker of notes, always writing, abstracting 
and compiling. At six years of age his father said that he 
was "a quicksand in which everything disappeared." At 
thirty he regarded his son's mind as nothing more than 
"a mirror in which everything paints itself for a moment 
and then vanishes." The criticism was unjust. In later 
days he was compelled to lay aside his prejudice and 
admit that he had "genius," but the genius lay less in the 
ideas themselves than in his way of expressing them. The 
old Marquis was right when he said that "everything in 
his son came from reminiscence." What Mirabeau 
M i6i 



MIRABEAU 

borrowed he transformed, and at once "made it grind out 
fine phrases." In him the teachings of the philosophes 
and the economists which had been produced before his 
day found a lingering and sonorous echo. He assimilated 
the doctrines of others, made them his own, developed 
them in his writings, and finally imparted to them the 
force and splendour of an eloquence the incomparable 
power of which was as yet unsuspected even by himself. 
These doctrines, at any rate until the convocation of the 
States-General, were not embodied in a definite programme, 
nor did they form a distinct and definite whole. They 
reveal his tendencies, however, and, such as they are, if 
he did not make them, they were destined to make him 
what he was. 

He was a Royalist. His views and intentions on this 
point are contained in a passage in a letter to the Due de 
Lauzun, dated November 14, 1788: "At the National 
Assembly I shall be a very zealous monarchist, because 
I am profoundly conscious of the necessity of killing the 
despotism of ministers and exalting the royal supremacy." 
Good citizens who knew the country and nation well could 
not be in favour of a republican constitution. They felt 
that France was "geographically monarchical," and no 
doubt he meant by this somewhat vague, though 
picturesque phrase, that "the antipathetic aggregations" 
in the kingdom required the cement of the royal authority. 
But this authority must not be either absolute or despotic. 
In his Lettres de Cachet he had already affirmed that "the 
right of sovereignty rests solely and indefeasibly with the 
people; the sovereign therefore can be no more than the 
first magistrate of the people." The people does not 
abdicate but delegates its powers. "The aggregation of 
representatives is the nation, and all those who are not 
representatives must have been electors from the very fact 
that they are represented." This phrase contains the whole 
theory of universal suffrage, and, when he gave expression 

162 



AT THE STATES - GENERAL 

to it in the States of Provence, Mirabeau was in advance 
of his age. The necessities and the problems of the 
moment, however, did not escape him. If he agrees in the 
poHtical interest of the State that the class distinction of 
the three orders should be maintained, it is only on con- 
dition that they shall enter into the constitution of the 
whole in proportion to their relative importance. "The 
States are to the nation what a map on a reduced scale 
is to its physical extent. Whether it be large or small the 
copy must always have the same proportions as the 
original." The equality of the number of the commons 
with those of the two higher orders will be the conquest 
of prejudice by reason. Assemblies must be periodical 
and must agree to taxation, must assure the individual 
liberty of the citizens and the freedom of the press, which 
is the sole and sacred guarantee of all other rights. The 
principle of ministerial responsibility must be established, 
for in it Mirabeau sees "the only foundation for inviolable 
respect for the royal authority." Liberty without equality 
would be merely a delusion. Privileges must therefore be 
abolished; "useful against kings, they are detestable when 
used against a nation," and the hour of a nation's unity 
precedes but a little their final destruction. A republic, 
moreover, which was composed of all these aristocracies 
would be nothing but "a hotbed of tyranny." The meet- 
ing of an assembly "just, wise, apportioned fairly among 
the different members of the State," would put an end to 
the intrigues and plots of "these implacable corporations," 
which, under pretence of defending the general interest 
and the liberty of the public, think of nothing but the 
perpetuation of a corrupt and intolerable domination. 
Mirabeau disapproved of the conduct of the Parlements 
in overstepping their jurisdiction to enter the political 
sphere, thus arrogating to themselves a sort of tribunician 
power. The ministerial despotism of "the frenzied Arch- 
bishop " of Toulouse had made them the ostensible 

163 



MIRABEAU 

guardians of the rights of the nation. But when on 
December 5, 1788, the Parlement of Paris, while it sup- 
ported the doubUng of the Tiers £tat, went on to elaborate 
a whole programme of reforms, Mirabeau could not refrain 
from observing that if it was an excellent thing for the 
public welfare, "it was a strange proceeding for a judicial 
body." Already he had written to M. de Montmorin : 
"The Government would be maladroit indeed which placed 
France under the sway of the Parlements." His political 
formula against the privileged classes was short, clear and 
to the point. "The legislative power of the nation under 
the presidency of its King must be recognized." 

Did Mirabeau count on Louis XVI to carry out these 
reforms and to secure that France should, through a con- 
stitution, "realize the development of her high destiny"? 
In 1780 he alluded to the King's favourite amusements 
somewhat irreverently by calling him "a pusher of 
planes " ; and somewhat later he pronounced a more pro- 
found judgment on him in a reference to "his sincere and 
inert virtue." In the Memoires du Ministere du Due 
d'Aiguillon, in which it is difficult to distinguish between 
the notes left by Mirabeau and their redaction by the 
Abb6 Soulavie, there is a significant passage on the 
volonte de vouloir which Turgot should have communi- 
cated to his sovereign. "This Prince desires the good of 
his people ; placed as he is in the centre of corruption and 
disorder he would rejoice to secure it. But the fear of 
doing wrong will condemn him to inaction." Neverthe- 
less, both because he was sure that the King's intentions 
were honest and because his help was indispensable in 
reforming abuses if "great civil tumults" were to be 
avoided, he placed his trust in Louis XVI. In 1775 when 
he was confined in the Chateau de Joux he exclaimed : 
"O Louis ! O my King, you love virtue and justice : each 
step you have taken in the dread career of sovereignty has 
been signalized by a good deed." In 1787 he laid at the 

164 



AT THE STATES-GENERAL 

feet of the sovereign his Denonciation de V Agiotage. In 
1788 he concluded his Reponse aux alarmes des bons 
citoyens with a salute to the monarch "who had so nobly 
approached his subjects," and invoking the example of 
Marcus Aurelius, he had expressed the wish that "he 
should abandon nothing but the power to do evil." Finally, 
in order to calm the minds of the people of Marseilles, he 
had appealed on behalf of the "good King whom we must 
not distress, and who will love and esteem you more and 
more." 

Though he was a Royalist, and though in the absence 
of energy he confided in the virtues and the goodwill of 
Louis XVI, Mirabeau was irreligious. In his Essai sur 
le despotisme, as in the Lettres ecrites du donjon de 
Vincennes, he had not merely attacked theocracy, he had 
violently and disrespectfully assailed the Catholic religion 
and its ordinances. In the Monarchie prussienne these 
attacks had been renewed and aggravated. jThis "affecta- 
tion of philosophisme " had shocked the Marquis de Mira- 
beau. The old man had been struck with the qualities 
"of style and thought" which distinguished Mirabeau's 
little book on the political reform of the Jews, but he had 
deplored the totally and manifestly irreligious character 
of its fundamental propositions, especially in certain 
details. This time the book was dedicated to him, and 
his censure had been the more vigorous. He "powerfully 
and copiously reproached" his son "for rending the 
garment suited to all shapes which so many great men 
had kept and made their own." Mirabeau defended him- 
self "in honeyed tones and prepared terms," saying that 
he had been deeply struck by the course of events in 
Germany, and that the garment of which his father had 
spoken was of no use to that people among whom 
clerical encroachments had always been resisted. Apart 
from its tone this answer seems really to have expressed 
his ideas as a statesman which had led him to distinguish 

165 



MIRABEAU 

between the respect due to religion and a proper resistance 
to the political intrigues of which religion is so often at 
once the cloak and the tool. "When the civil power 
declares in favour of a religious opinion," he said, when 
in the Keep of Vincennes, "intolerance is the necessary- 
consequence. In religion, as in all departments of civil 
life, competition is the surest guarantee of equilibrium. 
Every man has the right to follow his own judgment in the 
matter of doctrine, provided that his conduct is in all 
respects governed by the law, which should protect all 
forms of religion." 

He had inserted this right and this obligation in Article 
XXV of the declaration appended to his Addresse aux 
Bataves. "All forms of religion should be admitted." 
Since writing the Monarchie prussienne his mind had 
broadened. In his correspondence with Major Mauvillon 
there is a letter dated October 22, 1788, in which Mirabeau 
affirms in lofty terms his "extreme tolerance of all philo- 
sophic and religious opinions," the benefit of which he 
would not refuse even to the "rosary people." He would 
not "excommunicate anybody, and, indeed, in a sense I 
find merit in them all. Events, men, things, opinions- 
all offer a handle, something one can grasp." He found 
this handle where no one would have expected it who did 
not know how supple and far-sighted was his political 
genius. Before the order of the clergy had manifested its 
resistance he displayed a special solicitude for the parish 
priests, "these venerable figures whose august and sacred 
functions have not saved them from feudal degradation, 
who mix with the people, share the people's needs, the 
people's privations, misery and tears, and also the people's 
rigid virtue." It is not difficult to see in this compliment, 
sincere as it is, a tactical move which was destined to be 
repeated. 

It may next be inquired whether these political and 
religious ideas proceeded from a complete system of 

166 



AT THE STATES-GENERAL 

philosophy. It would be difficult to prove that Mirabeau 
belonged to any particular school, or that he was the 
disciple of this or that great philosopher of the eighteenth 
century. It has been incorrectly said that he did not like 
Voltaire, of whom he spoke with enthusiasm if not with 
justice; but "for history and philosophy" he preferred 
Rousseau and Buffon, and Montesquieu came next in his 
regard. His admiration, however, did not overcome his 
independence. Apart from other reserves, he devoted a 
whole chapter of his Lettres de Cachet, full of argument 
and fact, to confuting the celebrated dictum in the Esprit 
des Lois to the effect that "there are cases in which it is 
necessary for a moment to put a veil on liberty as one 
hides the statues of the Gods." I have already said how 
vehemently he argued against Rousseau that Society in 
the natural state of man, and that "man is the necessary 
support of man's weakness." It must, however, be admitted 
that if Rousseau's influence on Mirabeau was not exclusive 
it was predominant. The Nowuelle Heloise "developed his 
sensibility," to use a phrase of which Mirabeau was very 
fond. But he was saturated with l^mile, "that magnificent 
poem" (he underlines the words), that "admirable work 
which contains so many new truths." Among these truths 
there was none which he took up, developed and urged 
with more force than that which is concerned with the 
physical education of children. The beneficent audacity of 
his precepts, which have been so tardily (and still so incom- 
pletely) put in practice, makes Mirabeau a true precursor 
whom ingratitudeor ignorance has deprived of his due credit. 
As regards his economic doctrines Mirabeau owed much 
to the physiocrats, though he denied that he belonged to 
their ranks. The amusing, if terrible, abstract which he 
made while at Vincennes of the principles and maxims 
of the Ami des Hommes was designed not so much to 
confute the theories of the author, as to establish a con- 
tradiction between his acts and his ideas. As a matter of 

167 



MIRABEAU 

fact he was an admirer and, even indeed considered him- 
self, a disciple of his father. In 1786, when he was laying 
Major Mauvillon under contribution for information about 
Saxony, he adds, "Always from the physiocratic point of 
view, for I have never had and never can have any other." 
From this school of thought he accepted the principle that 
"agriculture is the most important business of a Govern- 
ment," and the necessary consequences as regards taxation 
which were deduced therefrom by the theorists. He 
admired Turgot as "a good man, a statesman, a man of 
genius," and he reproached Necker "for having by his 
intrigues caused the fall of the only Minister from whom 
France could hope for regeneration." 

Theoretically armed for political action and fortified, in 
default of a systematic philosophy, by very wide know- 
ledge, Mirabeau, when he entered the States-General, had 
also the advantage of a practical acquaintance with nearly 
all sorts of business. In Provence, in Limousin, at Le 
Bignon, under the direction of his uncle and his father 
he had been an agriculturist, associated with the labourers 
of the fields, and the work of tilling the ground had no 
mysteries for him. As a pleader in civil and criminal 
cases at Pontarlier and at Aix, he had suffered from the 
vices of procedure and from the partiality of judges. His 
own painful experience lent force to his denunciation of 
the abuses of the judicial system and his clear-sighted 
advocacy of reforms. As a financial journalist he had 
been initiated by the most competent men into the 
mechanism of credit and discount and movable property. 
With the Bailli he had discussed naval questions and 
colonial questions on which the ex-governor of Guade- 
loupe had composed important memoirs. A soldier, he 
proclaimed that he was "above all a man of war," and if 
he had not, as he professed, read through the three hundred 
authors in living and dead languages on the military art 
it could not be denied that he had made a long and careful 

168 



AT THE STATES-GENERAL 

study of military questions. He had travelled much, either 
by necessity or for his pleasure, and he knew England, 
Prussia, Holland, and Switzerland. As a diplomatist at 
the Court of Berlin he had observed from the inside the 
intrigues and the designs of European politics, and, 
following the example of Frederick the Great himself, 
princes, ambassadors, and ministers had not disdained to 
converse with him. 

Then his power of assimilation was prodigious, his 
insight rapid, penetrating and often prophetic, his culture 
almost universal, his intelligence prompt and lucid, his 
self-possession in serious emergencies extraordinary, his 
oratory many coloured, vehement, clear, supple and incom- 
parable. With all this he was gay, witty and original. 
He had an innate and all-compelling charm, "a terrible gift 
of familiarity which enabled him to turn the great round 
his little finger, but which also attracted the small." Even 
his creditors were disarmed by his eloquence. His heart 
was light, fickle, and inconstant, but incapable of rancour 
or deliberate malice. He had, in a word, all the gifts of a 
unique genius. What was it that he lacked? 

We come back inevitably to what he said so sadly to 
M. de La Marck passing judgment on himself. "Ah, how 
the immorality of my youth is injuring the public welfare ! " 
No doubt his youth had been stormy, full of trials and 
immoralities. But in the eighteenth century debts to 
money-lenders, some facile adulteries, a collusive abduc- 
tion and a scandalous divorce were perhaps insufficient 
in themselves to discredit and condemn a man. Without 
reaching the throne itself there had been other scandals 
not far from it which had been quickly forgotten and for- 
given. If, therefore, Mirabeau was right in deploring the 
passions and the errors of his youth, did he not exaggerate 
the importance of their consequences ? They had been 
noised abroad and had made him famous. In spite of 
his transgressions (I dare not say because of them) the 

169 



MIRABEAU 

most powerful monarch in Europe had twice received him 
with intimate cordiaUty, and they had not prevented the 
virtuous Franklin from entrusting him with a book 
intended in some sort as a moral appeal to the republicans 
of his country. If the truth must be told the discredit 
whose importunate shadow Mirabeau saw fall on his 
rising fame was not merely the price he had to pay for a 
stormy youth. In his riper age he had given rise to more 
serious complaints and to darker suspicions. When his 
father reproached him with being "in the pay of the 
speculators " and living on the charity of bankers, he was 
not merely expressing his habitual hostile prejudice ; he 
was echoing a common rumour. Mirabeau's adversaries 
did not hesitate to impute interested motives to his financial 
crusades. They accused him of venality, and the sus- 
picion was so widely spread that his relations, afterwards 
so cordial and confidential, with the Comte de La Marck 
were at first impeded thereby. Sometimes, too, his conduct 
was such as to disconcert his best friends. On the publica- 
tion of his Reponse aux alarmes des bons citoyens, which 
noisily and unexpectedly espoused the cause of the Ministry 
against the Parlements, the Due de Lauzun could not but 
express his surprise and remonstrate with Mirabeau in 
terms the vigour and precision of which may be divined 
from the explanations which he received. Why did Mira- 
beau implore his friend not "to judge hastily even in the 
most nebulous circumstances " ? It may be presumed that 
the "judgment" referred to had been more severe than 
a mere difference of opinion about the political situation 
would have justified. Some months later the Histoire 
secrete de la cour de Berlin had caused a double astonish- 
ment. Some (see the Correspondance of Grimm and 
Diderot) were indignant that "a man of parts" should 
have condescended "to take the paltry pay of a subordinate 
spy at the Prussian Court." Others attacked the cynical 
dishonesty of the publication. All mercilessly attacked 

170 



AT THE STATES-GENERAL 

the " diplomatic jockey " whose rash imprudence had given 
them an opportunity of parading their hatred, their 
jealousy or their fears. This time the Marquis saw clearly 
enough. "In the end," he said of his son, "he will reap 
the harvest which comes to people who are wanting in 
the fundamental principles of morals : no one will trust 
him, even if he wishes to deserve their trust." 

On his return to Paris Mirabeau was enabled to judge 
by the attitude of the Abbe de Perigord the measure of 
confidence which he inspired, ^iis old friend at Pan- 
chaud's, the correspondent to whom he had written from 
Berlin, his colleague in the Constitutional Club which had 
been founded on the convocation of the States-General, 
refused to see him. Nothing could have brought home 
to him so forcibly how compromising his company was 
considered. It would be incorrect to judge by his letters 
of the sentiments he entertained towards the Abbe. The 
one object of his compliments and his flatteries was to 
secure Talleyrand's influence. It was only in private that 
he expressed his real opinion, which was both harsh and 
prophetic. In 1787 he defined the Abbe de Perigord in a 
letter to d'Antraigues as "a vile, greedy, base, intriguing 
fellow, whose one desire is mud and money. For money 
he would sell his soul, and he would be right, for he would 
be exchanging a dunghill for gold." Between these two 
men, who were so dissimilar, there might be a transitory 
agreement of interests, but of sympathy such as arises from 
the harmony of character and the union of hearts there 
could be none. With his prodigal generosity, his ostenta- 
tious dissoluteness, his exuberant ambition, his whole 
florid and familiar tone and manner, Mirabeau jarred upon 
the dry elegance, the calculated egotism, the perfidious dis- 
simulation of the Abbe de Perigord. After the publication 
of the Monarchie prussienne, thinking he had grounds for 
complaint of Talleyrand's criticisms, Mirabeau wrote a 
letter (the draft, at any rate, exists) in which the laboured 

171 



MIRABEAU 

persiflage is more sincere than the affection expressed. 
The Histoire secrete had led to a quarrel, but Mirabeau 
thought that it would pass off. On his election as Deputy 
for Aix he had not visited the Abbe "in order not to 
embarrass him " (these words alone tell us much) ; but in 
order to form a new "coalition" with him he had had 
recourse to the good offices of the Due de Lauzun. He 
thought that "the small conventions of coteries should 
disappear in the presence of great national affairs." The 
Bishop of Autun evaded the suggestion, and this conveyed 
very clearly to Mirabeau that his company was considered 
more dangerous than profitable. 

The Histoire secrete had caused other troubles. Almost 
at the moment of its publication he had written to M. de 
Montmorin (December 28, 1788) a letter of great import- 
ance. Looking back on his past he flattered himself (per- 
haps with excessive complacency) that he had "triumphed 
over all," but what he said of the future was surprisingly 
valuable. Once in action Mirabeau rose superior to all 
the men of his time, because alone among them he knew, 
if not what ought to be done, at least what he wanted to 
do. He had ideas, a programme, a method. As a citizen 
he trembles "for the royal authority, more than ever 
necessary at the moment when it is on the verge of ruin." 
This phrase should be remembered and considered. It is 
the point of departure of a whole policy which it sum- 
marizes, announces and prepares. On the eve of the meet- 
ing of "a tumultuous assembly which is about to decide 
the fate of the monarchy," Mirabeau was anxious to know 
whether the Minister who had convoked the States-General 
was considering the means whereby he would be emanci- 
pated from fear of their control, or, rather, whereby he could 
work usefully with them. Had he a fixed and solid plan 
which the representatives of the nation would have nothing 
to do but to sanction ? Mirabeau left no time to the Minister 
to answer this question which he had put merely in order 

172 



AT THE STATES-GENERAL 

to offer his solution. "Here is the plan, M. le Comte," 
he said. "It is connected with the scheme of a constitution 
which would save us from the plots of the aristocracy, the 
excuses of democracy, and from the profound anarchy into 
which authority, wishing to be absolute, has fallen. If 
the details of the plan are open to discussion it is, at any 
rate, impossible to dispute its fundamental principles." 
A man must be very sure of himself to write like this, and 
indeed amid all the hesitating and pusillanimous persons 
who were as undecided about the end as about the means, 
Mirabeau alone felt that he was strong. More than that, 
he felt that he was a force. Would they ever "have the 
courage to call to his duties as a citizen a faithful subject, 
a brave man and an intrepid defender of justice and 
truth ? " They should meet and come to an understanding 
without delay. "Three months is not too much in which 
to prepare to unite the country and to show ourselves 
willing defenders of the throne and the public good." 

M. de Montmorin did not answer ! Was he offended 
by the tone of the letter? Did he fear to compromise 
himself with Mirabeau, or rather to face the "vindictive 
humour" of Necker, "the implacable vizier"? One can- 
not tell. He kept silence until two months later, when 
he answered a letter from Mirabeau, who- was complaining 
with extraordinary impudence of having been made the 
subject of newspaper attacks in connection with the 
Histoire secrete, and offered to meet the Minister in order 
to tell him about affairs in Provence. M. de Montmorin 
took a high tone of injured dignity, and said that it was 
his duty to discover and punish the publisher of the corre- 
spondence, and expressing regret that the esteem and 
friendship he had himself shown to Necker had not pre- 
served the latter from the attacks in the Lettres a Cerutti. 
"I should certainly have desired. Monsieur," he added, "to 
have helped to restore you to a position worthy of your 
birth and talents, but I see that that pleasure is not 



/ 

MIRABEAU 

reserved for me." He curtly refused the audience 
requested. "After all that I have had the honour to say 
to you in this letter it seems to me, to say the least, 
useless that I should henceforth have that of receiving 
you in my house." 

This letter was entrusted to the Due de Lauzun, now 
the Due de Biron, on February 2, 1789, but was not 
delivered to Mirabeau until April 24. The tone of the 
reply shows clearly how much things had changed in the 
intervening two months. "Permit me to say, M. le Comte, 
that your letter has too little of the courtesy of the century 
which is passing, and too much of its principles. You 
do not seem to appreciate the time in which you live, and 
in spite of the respect which I desire to show the King's 
Ministers and in spite of the affectionate regard which I 
shall still preserve for you, I cannot omit to observe that 
threats towards me can come with neither propriety nor 
grace from any man, whatever his position. As to see- 
ing you, M. le Comte, when I asked for an interview I 
was no more than a simple citizen, a faithful and zealous 
subject of the King, who believed himself able to give 
to you and through you some useful information about 
Provence and the means of preventing all that has hap- 
pened there. Well, M. le Comte, I accept with regret as 
a private person the honour of the proscription which you 
impose upon me out of devotion to a saint whom you 
have not always worshipped so fervently. As a public 
man, which I have become since your letter was written, I 
declare to the King's Minister that if ever, in the interest 
of my constituents I have occasion to request an audience, 
I should think I was doing them wrong if, far from having 
any need to beg for it, I did not expect to receive it 
immediately." 

There is a great gulf between this letter and that sent by 
Mirabeau to the same address at the end of 1788. The peti- 
tioner has abandoned his attitude of supplication. They 

174 



AT THE STATES-GENERAL 

had then refused him employment ; he has now a mandate 
which he uses for defence and attack. They had disdained 
his services ; he now demands an account of their steward- 
ship. For a year or more he had had a presentiment of this 
position, but throughout his career he had never despaired, 
neither in the depths of his dungeon at Vincennes, where 
clothed in rags and shivering with cold he had tried to 
appease by constant labour the boiling ardours of his 
imagination ; nor in Holland, where he had gained his 
living as a bookseller's hack ; nor in Prussia, where he had 
raised his obscure mission and had forced the doors of 
ambassadors and ministers whose equal he some day 
hoped to become. To a young man, who in July 1788 
offered himself as his private secretary, he declared that 
"the future is in a cloud," but that behind the cloud he 
felt that the sun of his glory was rising. "Your interests," 
he continued, "cannot but profit by the variations of my 
fortune, for these variations can now only be fortunate. 
The time is coming when the power of talent will be 
greater and less perilous. Believe me, it is not when 
public opinion is forming itself that the convulsions of 
despotism are most to be feared by a man who can speak 
before that tribunal." When the States-General met that 
tribunal was open, and Mirabeau was at the bar. For his 
genius the hour of action had struck at last. 



175 



CHAPTER XII 

FROM THE OPENING OF THE STATES-GENERAL TO THE 
EVENTS OF OCTOBER I 789 

Mirabeau at the States-General — His debut and first successes — The 
Declaration of the Rights of Ma^tj the " Veto " — Speech on bankruptcy 
— The events of October — Mirabeau and the Due d'Orldans. 

Alone in the assembly of about eleven hundred mem- 
bers who constituted the States-General, Mirabeau was 
famous. His adventures, his misfortunes, and his writings 
had created for him a reputation and a legend. It was 
for him first of all that people looked. " It was difficult," 
says Mme. de Stael, "not to look long at him once one 
had perceived him. The great mass of his hair distin- 
guished him among all others, and one would have said 
that his strength, like Samson's, depended upon it. His 
very ugliness lent expression to his countenance, and his 
whole person conveyed the idea of an irregular force, but 
of a force such as might be found in a Tribune of the 
People." There was more curiosity than sympathy, and 
above all than esteem, in the attention of which Mirabeau 
was the object. He was despised and feared. On the 
day of the opening of the States-General, when his turn 
came to enter the hall with the deputation from Aix, he 
was received with murmurs of disapprobation. He sup- 
ported this first ordeal, the significance of which could 
not escape him, with scornful pride. His anxiety had 
been roused "by the fury of hatred and the activity of 
intrigue," and he expected to be violently attacked even 
among the Commons when his credentials were examined. 
His Journal des ]£tats Generaux, which he had published 

176 



THE STATES-GENERAL 

without regard to the special regulations of the political 
press, reflected his bitterness. Not content with attacking 
the speeches and the plans of Necker, whose popularity 
was immense, he took a high tone with the Assembly itself. 
In conversation he was neither more indulgent nor more 
prudent. Warned by friends, he calmed himself and 
waited. His Journal having been suspended by a decree 
of the Council, he substituted for it the Lettres du Comte 
de Mirabeau a ses commettants. This audacity, supported 
by public opinion, vanquished the Keeper of the Seals. 
The liberty of the press, before being recognized as a right, 
was thus secured. Mirabeau as an author had always 
advocated it. It is no more than justice to give him credit 
for his achievements. 

Outside and above the groups which, beneath its 
apparent unity, composed the Tiers fitat, he had marked 
out for himself an independent line of conduct. While 
Siey^s owed his authority to his theories, Mirabeau ex- 
pected to derive his influence from the unaided activity of 
his genius. In the course of his campaign in Provence he 
had measured the power of his eloquence, and in it he 
placed his hopes of being able to conquer the prejudices, 
to break down the resistance, and to secure the assent and 
subjection of the Assembly. "It is a hard task to have 
set one's self," he wrote, "to aim at the public good with- 
out conciliating any party, without sacrificing to the idol 
of the day, with no other arms than reason and truth, 
respecting these always and respecting nothing else, 
having no other friends than they, and no other enemies 
than their antagonists, recognizing no monarch but con- 
science and no other judge than time. Well ! I may 
succumb in this enterprise, but I shall never draw back ! " 

While he awaited an opportunity of putting this proud 
speech into practice, his policy was prevailing. He had 
been the first to see that it would be enough for the people 
"to stand still in order to be formidable to their enemies." 

N 177 



MIRABEAU 

The inactivity of the Tiers Etat, its immobility and force 
of inertia, disconcerted the pretensions of the clergy and 
the nobiHty and annihilated their action. Mirabeau did 
not boast without reason of having urged the dignity and 
the skill of this attitude. On May i8 he opposed this 
principle to the proposition of Rabaut-Saint-Etienne, who 
wanted to send sixteen commissaries to the two other 
orders to secure their union, and to that of Le Chapelier, 
who wanted the illegality of their conduct to be demon- 
strated. Mirabeau distinguished between the two orders. 
He had no confidence in the proud and usurping manners 
of the nobility, but he did not despair of the clergy, who, 
"either from an enlightened conception of their own 
interest, or from a freer policy," might play the part of 
a mediator. On May 27, after the abortive conferences, 
he persuaded the Assembly to send a deputation to the 
clergy to persuade them to come to the common place of 
meeting, and thus place themselves "on the side of reason, 
justice and truth." Had it not been for the unexpected 
intervention of the King this profoundly politic overture 
would, no doubt, have succeeded. The King, "in order 
to contribute directly to a desirable and immediate agree- 
ment," proposed the resumption of the conferences of the 
conciliatory commissaries in the presence of the Keeper of 
the Seals and commissioners appointed by him, who would 
report to him what passed. Mirabeau, always vigilant, 
made clear the dangers of accepting this proposal, which 
would lead to a decree of the Council, and the inconvenience 
of refusing, which might enable their adversaries to secure 
the dissolution of the States on the pretext that their 
insubordinate independence was destructive of the royal 
authority. In order to defeat this manoeuvre he advised 
them to accept the King's invitation, but at the same time 
to inform him, by means of an address, both of their inviol- 
able attachment to his person and of their intention to 
agree to nothing which would compromise the principle 

178 



THE STATES -GENERAL 

that the powers of members of the Assembly should be 
verified in joint session. This counsel prevailed. 

These discussions had given Mirabeau the opportunity 
of displaying in written speeches his abilities both 
dialectical and tactical. But the orator had not yet revealed 
himself. A single incident was enough to elicit a ringing 
and passionate improvisation, which produced the first 
acclamations with which the Tiers Etat ever greeted his 
words. In the course of the sitting of June ii a deputy 
protested against the presence on the very benches of the 
Assembly of a stranger who had passed a note to Mira- 
beau. Astonishment was on the point of becoming anger, 
when the piercing tones of the orator imposed silence. 
He admitted the irregularity of the stranger's presence, 
but as his friend had been denounced as a pensioner of 
England he gave his name, and protested against "this 
odious imputation." It was Duroveray, a Genevese 
refugee, a former procureur-g^neral, and in flaming words 
he recalled the history of his life as a citizen and a jurist, 
devoted with the noblest disinterestedness to the cause of 
liberty. Dumont, who was present, records that the success 
of this extempore utterance was complete. It was received 
with thunders of applause from all parts of the House. 
" In the tumultuous preliminaries of the Commons, nothing 
of such force and dignity had as yet been heard. It was 
a new pleasure, new because eloquence is a spell which can 
only be cast upon men in an assembly. Mirabeau felt this 
first success deeply." 

The influence of Dumont, a man of wide culture, who 
had formerly been a Protestant pastor at Geneva, and who 
had lived much in England, and that of Duroveray had 
contributed to bring about a meeting between Mirabeau 
and Necker, a few days before this eventful sitting. Malouet 
had been their intermediary, for, though he was prejudiced 
against the deputy for Aix, and deeply distrusted him, he 
was well aware of the advantage which his talent could 

179 



MIRABEAU 

give to the party he might choose to support. Necker did 
not refuse the interview, but he did not come to terms. 
He was dry and cold, and showed neither cordiahty nor 
confidence. Such a reception disconcerted Mirabeau, who 
said, " I shall not try again, but they will soon hear of me." 
Necker was too sensitive to the attacks which he had so 
recently had to endure, and failed to perceive what he 
could do with the force offered to him, both for the 
furtherance of his own views and for the defence of the 
monarchy. The opportunity thus missed unhappily did 
not recur. 

Mirabeau 's disappointment did not affect his prudence. 
He had not won over "the idol of the day," but he remained 
faithful to his purpose of not flattering any party to the 
detriment of what he believed to be reason and truth. 
When some members of the clergy had joined the 
Commons the time had come for the latter to constitute 
themselves. What title were they to take? Siey^s, in his 
celebrated pamphlet, had written the prophetic lines, " It 
will be said that the Tiers alone cannot form the States- 
General. Very well, they will form a National Assembly." 
But behind the theorist was the tactician, who thought it 
imprudent to take this decisive step immediately, and he 
proposed that the Commons should at first constitute them- 
selves under the title of "assembly of the recognized and 
verified representatives of the French nation." Mirabeau 
objected that this title was not intelligible, and might come 
into collision with a refusal of the royal sanction ; moreover, 
it would alarm people, and would require modification if 
the privileged orders decided for union. 

Are we to believe with Michelet that in taking this 
position Mirabeau wished to confront the Revolution, to 
stop it and bar its way? This is to misunderstand him 
and to judge him on intentions which were not his. As 
he told Malouet, he feared the evils and the terrible com- 
motions which might result from the ferment arising on 

1 80 



THE STATES -GENERAL 

the one hand from the inexperience and exaltation of the 
Assembly, and on the other from the ill-considered and 
bitter resistance of the two higher orders. He wished that 
moderation (he did not fear to use the word) should be 
joined with courage, in order that what was done might be 
durable and invincible. He feared (wrongly, it is true) 
the danger of a prorogation or a dissolution of the 
Assembly, and perhaps it would have been better not to 
give expression to the fear, thus suggesting what might 
not otherwise have been conceived. But he foresaw killing 
and plundering, and to avoid this without abating a jot of 
his principles or the rights of the Tiers Etat, he preached 
prudence and wisdom and "a constitutional and graduated 
policy." He was a partisan of a National Assembly, but 
he did not yet despair of bringing in the privileged orders, 
and before proclaiming the Assembly without them and 
against them, he made a last attempt to persuade them to 
join in taking this step. 

The title he proposed, "The Representatives of the 
French People," seemed to him to be a phrase of magical 
potency. It had in his eyes the advantage of including 
everything, and being adaptable to any situation. With 
it they could "increase the consequence of the Assembly as 
circumstances might require, if the privileged classes by 
their errors and their obstinacy compelled them to take in 
hand the defence of the rights of the nation and the liberty 
of the people." From this point of view Mirabeau's motion 
had advantages which were no doubt incontestable, but 
from the outset it raised an objection which from the very 
fact of the open conflict of the orders necessarily led to its 
rejection. The word "people" meant either too much or 
too little, according as it was extended to the whole nation 
in the sense of populus, or was restricted to a mere fraction 
(and that the fraction believed to be the less important) in 
the sense of plebs. Neither Mirabeau's arguments nor an 
eloquent peroration could overcome the legitimate appre- 

i8i 



MIRABEAU 

hension excited by this equivocal term. Mirabeau was 
overwhelmed with cries and insults. It was the first storm 
he had encountered, and he met it with the imperturbable 
coolness which never deserted him. It was not merely his 
proposal that was against him ; it must be admitted that his 
character had damaged his position, and his past his 
arguments. He was suspected of having capitulated to 
the Government. He laughed at the suggestion. "The 
truth is," he observed, "I sell myself to so many people 
that I cannot understand why I have not acquired a 
universal monarchy." At bottom, however, he was 
wounded, for he knew only too well where lay the weak- 
ness by which he was haunted and chagrined. Never, 
even before he had bound himself, was he believed to be 
free. The terrors of suspicion, whether it rose out of the 
misdeeds of the past or clung to the circumstances of the 
present, weighed on him like a nightmare. 

The audacity of the Tiers Etat in constituting itself a 
National Assembly was wiser than the calculated prudence 
of Mirabeau. These two words by themselves made the 
whole Revolution. From the decisive sitting of June 17 
onwards there was hardly an important event in which 
Mirabeau did not share, or a debate in which he did not 
intervene. To follow his career is to write the history of 
the Constituent Assembly, and it is difficult to choose 
between a dry catalogue of his interventions and an 
elaborate study of the deliberations and decisions of that 
body. As it is absolutely impossible to be complete, I 
must try at least to give some idea of the man himself, as 
well as of his acts and his ideas, from the speeches which 
he made. 

Was there any unity behind the many contradictions 
which we find, and was the diversity of the means he used 
inconsistent with a fixed plan ? It will be remembered 
with what firm self-confidence he had offered a plan of his 
own contriving to M. de Montmorin, who showed him the 

182 



THE STATES-GENERAL 

door, and how he wished to discuss it with Necker, who 
gave him no encouragement. Before he reduced it to a 
governmental programme he sketched it fragmentarily on 
various occasions. To Malouet he declared that he did 
not wish to shake the monarchy ; he wished for a free but 
monarchical constitution. To the Comte de La Marck he 
partially revealed his ideas, the decisive firmness of which 
he contrasted with the indecision of Necker. "The lot of 
France is decided, the watchwords of liberty of taxation 
agreed to by the people have resounded through the king- 
dom. We shall be content with nothing less than a 
Government more or less like that of England." To Major 
Mauvillon at the same time he appeared in a much more 
decidedly revolutionary character. " Is it the French 
People or the hundred thousand individuals who think 
themselves a caste apart who are to give laws to France ? " 
But he was also a prudent monarchist. "They are angry 
with me for always suggesting moderate counsels. But 
I am convinced that there is a great difference between 
travelling on the map and on terra firma. The surest way 
of making the Revolution abortive is to ask too much of 
it." The whole man is seen in these contrasts, which are 
not so much contradictions as different aspects of one 
policy. 

From this moment the general lines of this policy were 
well defined in his mind. He knew how, where and how 
far he wanted to go, and in the development of the Revolu- 
tion he found an unhoped-for coincidence of his ideas and 
his interests. Hitherto his life had been that of a kind of 
adventurer, squandering in vain endeavours the resources 
of his mind and the energy of his character. His dream 
was to be a statesman, and to prove the quality of the 
genius which distinguished him from other men. "The 
time has come," he said, "when men are to be estimated 
by what they carry in the little space under their foreheads 
between their two eyebrows." Devoted to the interests of 

183 



MIRABEAU 

the People, who "were all to him," and to whom he had 
united his destinies, he found the only protection of their 
rights, the sole guarantee of their sovereignty, in a 
monarchy liberated and liberal, and it is not surprising 
that as a convinced Royalist he should turn to the King, 
whom he wished to deliver from the fatal influences which 
surrounded him, and whose confidence he wished above all 
things to gain. "The ship of State," he said, "is labouring 
in a violent storm, and there is no one at the helm." He 
had the strength to take the helm, but if it was too soon 
to make him the pilot, could he not at least keep a watch ? 
He said to the Comte de La Marck, "Take care that they 
know at the palace that I am rather with them than against 
them." These words date from the end of July, and came 
close upon some of the boldest speeches on which Mira- 
beau ever ventured. There was no duplicity in this ; at 
most it was a piece of tactics. The help of the people and 
that of the King were equally necessary to him, and 
between the two he held the balance even, for if he was to 
secure his object he could sacrifice the rights of neither 
the one nor the other. His convictions and his designs 
alike imposed this attitude upon him ; but in his deliberate 
independence of party he exposed himself to the alternate 
suspicions of both sides. His revolutionary poses discon- 
certed the moderate element, while his prudence seemed 
treason to the revolutionaries. Between the one party and 
the other he manoeuvred, if not always with skill, at least 
with a magnificent courage. He excelled at covering his 
most hazardous moves with a coolness which nothing 
could conquer. He gave himself up body and soul, with 
all his admirable qualities and all his terrible defects, to 
the critical game in which his own destiny and that of his 
country were alike at stake. For four months he was in 
the thick of the fight attentive, and indefatigable, in the 
tribune, in the clubs, at his paper. His name and his 
handiwork are inseparable from all the great scenes in 

184 



THE STATES-GENERAL 

which the Revolution was consummated, with the excep- 
tion of those of August 4. His insight, his audacity, his 
burning words assured success. They have made him 
immortal and are known to all. 

On June 23, after the Royal sitting which had so 
unpleasant a resemblance to a Bed of Justice, he hurled 
at M. de Breze, who ordered the immovable Tiers to dis- 
perse, the devastating reply, "We have heard the inten- 
tions which have been suggested to the King, and you, 
sir, who cannot be his mouthpiece in the National 
Assembly, have neither a place nor a vote nor the right 
to speak here. Go and tell them that sent you that we 
are here by the will of the people, and that bayonets alone 
shall drive us hence ! " 

On July 15, when for the third time a deputation went 
to request the King to send away the troops which 
threatened the Assembly, he exclaimed in a burst of 
indignation which shook the whole House, "Tell him that 
the foreign hordes by whom we are invested were yester- 
day visited by princes and princesses and by favourites 
male and female, who loaded them with gifts and caresses 
and exhortations. Tell him that all night long these 
foreign satellites, gorged with gold and wine, sang ribald 
songs predicting the enslavement of France, and that they 
brutally clamoured for the destruction of the National 
Assembly. Tell him that in his very palace the courtiers 
themselves danced to the sound of this barbaric music, and 
that such were the preliminaries of the Massacre of St. 
Bartholomew ! " 

These flaming words, never equalled in the Assembly, 
made his popularity and created the legend that to-day 
still surrounds his name. It would, however, be unjust to 
his fame to attribute it to them alone. Other manifesta- 
tions of his talent, of his political sense, have been for- 
gotten, which deserve a better fate but which can be recalled 
here only in broad outline. 

185 



MIRABEAU 

Troops, foreign for the most part, had been concentrated 
in the neighbourhood of Paris and Versailles. All passage 
was blocked. Everywhere there were military pickets, 
secret orders, preparations for war. Who was being 
protected ? Who was being threatened ? The deputies of 
the nation, wounded in their dignity and apprehensive for 
their safety, could not view these provocative preparations 
without emotion. At the sitting of July 8 Mirabeau made 
himself their spokesman. He made a speech which was 
measured as well as urgent, and the effect he produced 
was great. Was it his own or must we, on the authority 
of Dumont's Souvenirs, attribute the honour of its com- 
position to him in collaboration with Duroveray ? There 
is always a doubt as to the paternity of Mirabeau's 
speeches, which I shall try to elucidate further on. It may, 
however, be said at once that if the form of certain of his 
orations is not entirely his, the inspiration of them comes 
always from him and him alone. The political ideas, the 
intentions and methods they affirm are also his. All the 
sense of responsibility from which he never shrank is in 
them, and there is therefore no danger of judging him 
wrongly or of misunderstanding him. If he borrowed the 
pen of a friend to express his sentiments, he none the less 
said what he wished to say. When, in his speech of July 8, 
he spared the King, praised his good heart and distin- 
guished his generous intentions from the maladroitness of 
his counsellors, he was expressing the opinion which was 
the corner-stone of his policy. With extraordinary pre- 
science he saw what dangerous consequences would arise 
from the detestable policy of irritating the people by con- 
flicts between foreign and national troops. "Have they 
studied," he exclaimed, "in the history of every people 
how revolutions commence and how they are carried out ? 
Have they observed by what a fatal chain of circumstances 
the wisest men are driven far beyond the limits of modera- 
tion, and by what terrible impulses an enraged people is 

i86 



THE STATES-GENERAL 

precipitated into excesses at the very thought of which 
they would once have shuddered ? " 

The impression produced by this prophetic utterance 
was so profound that the Assembly charged Mirabeau 
with the task of drawing up an address to the King, 
requesting him to cancel measures so incompatible with 
the dignity and the freedom of the National Assembly. 
He read the address on the following day. It is inspired 
by the same sentiments as the speech, and though it is 
perhaps cast in a more pathetic form, it is not less respect- 
ful to the royal authority nor less firm in indicating the 
danger to which that authority was being exposed by 
rash and foolish counsellors. "There is a contagion in 
passionate movements. We are but human. Distrust of 
ourselves, the fear of seeming to be weak, may carry us 
beyond our purpose. We shall be besieged with violent 
and extravagant counsels. The calmness of reason and 
the tranquillity of prudence are silent amid tumult, dis- 
order and faction. Great revolutions have arisen from 
much less serious causes, and more than one enterprise 
fatal to a nation has had a less formidable and sinister 
commencement." 

He could not have spoken with more dignity or force; 
but his advice, dictated by care for the King's interests 
and the public good, was not followed. The King pro- 
posed that the Assembly should be removed to Noyon or 
Soissons. Mirabeau persuaded them to refuse. "We did 
not ask to be allowed to escape from the troops, but merely 
that the troops should leave the capital." He insisted on 
the public interest, but was neither heard nor understood. 
The dismissal of Necker precipitated the events which he 
had foreseen. Irritated, distrustful and driven to ex- 
tremities by the maladroltness and the provocations of 
the Court, the populace of Paris stormed the Bastille. 
The very next day the King was compelled to concede to 
rebellion what he had refused to good advice; he went in 

187 



MIRABEAU 

person to the Assembly to announce the recall of the 
troops. But unpopular Ministers remained in power. 
Mirabeau, who definitely took the part of leader, proposed 
an address to the King, demanding their dismissal. In 
vehement terms which respected nobody he denounced 
their policy, their hostility to the Assembly, the ill-starred 
plan of dissolving it. "Should a Prince who is the friend 
of his people be surrounded by the people's enemies ? " 
The Ministers resigned of their own accord. Who was to 
replace them ? The Assembly having expressed regret at 
Necker's dismissal, desired his recall. Mounier contended 
that in pronouncing either for or against the appointment 
of Ministers the Assembly was usurping powers which 
did not belong to them. 

To this Mirabeau replied, appealed to the essential right 
of the people, and for the first time laid down the principle 
of Ministerial responsibility, "more important, if that were 
possible, to the King than to his subjects." This short 
sentence contains a whole political theory which Mirabeau 
was to make one of the fundamental principles of his 
policy: he regarded it as nothing less than "the sacred 
guarantee of social peace." 

Social peace unfortunately was every daly more im- 
perilled. The murders occasioned by the events of July 14 
were followed by others. Foulon and Berthier were 
assassinated, and it became absolutely necessary to take 
measures to re-establish and maintain public order. Lally 
Tolendal on July 23 proposed that a proclamation should 
be issued to the people, enjoining respect for the law, for 
the peace and the loyalty due to the sovereign. Mirabeau 
thought, and with reason, that it was useless to compromise 
the dignity of the Assembly by half-measures. He saw 
at once that the cause of the evil lay in the absence of "all 
recognized authority," and in the confusion which had 
committed the reins of government to the hands of electors 
without a mandate. He urged the establishment of elected 

188 



THE STATES-GENERAL 

municipalities on the basis of a fusion of the three orders, 
with frequent changes in the Councils and the official 
staff. It is, however, much to be regretted that, in spite 
of Mounier's prudent warnings, his desire to gain 
popularity in the districts of Paris should have led him 
to sacrifice the superior and inalienable rights of the State 
to the free and, indeed, anarchical organization of munici- 
palities. Though his motion was not adopted, it was none 
the less a germ from which deplorable results were before 
long destined to spring. 

As regards his view of the assassinations of July 22, 
Number XIX of the letters to his constituents has been 
severely criticized. Mirabeau has been reproached with 
condoning the excesses of the populace. No one who has 
read this letter properly can interpret it in this sense. It 
explains rather than excuses the crimes which had been 
committed; it certainly does not approve of them. The 
writer refers to the excesses of the old regime, Vincennes, 
the Bastille, the refinements of torture in the old punish- 
ments, the threats uttered by the enemies of the Revolu- 
tion, their eager preparations for civil war, and against 
these he sets "the sudden and impetuous revenge of the 
multitude." He adds that "the injustice of the upper classes 
towards the people compels them to seek justice in 
barbarity." This, no doubt, goes too far ; but the explana- 
tions which may be thought to err on the side of leniency 
are followed and compensated by a conclusion which 
must be given in full. "The whole National Assembly 
has keenly felt that the continuation of this arbitrary 
dictatorship was threatening political freedom no less than 
the plots of its enemies. Society would soon be 
destroyed,^ if the multitude, grown accustomed to blood- 
shed and disorder, placed itself above the magistrates and 
defied the authority of the law. Instead of progressing 
towards liberty, the people would soon cast themselves into 

^ The italics are in the original. 
189 



MIRABEAU 

an abyss of slavery; for it too often happens that pubHc 
danger raUies men to despotism, and in the midst of 
anarchy even a tyrant seems a saviour ! " 

Mirabeau, moreover, had not awaited the disorders 
which grew out of the July riots in order to warn the 
people of the dangers of anarchy. On June 23 he had 
appeared in the character of the impetuous tribune ; but 
the very next day, in the address which he proposed that 
the National Assembly should send to the electors, he 
showed himself a true friend of the Government. It 
seemed to him to be necessary to inform, reassure and 
calm the nation, who were in danger of being seduced 
into perilous and criminal follies. He warned them that 
"agitations, tumults and excesses served none but the 
enemies of liberty." He referred in severe terms to the 
resistance of the aristocracy, which he contrasted with the 
good intentions of the King ; but he insisted that those 
who sought to achieve the public good in other ways 
should not be treated as enemies. He advised them to 
make allowance for the prejudices of upbringing, which 
had been still further developed by fear of licence and of 
exaggerated claims. His words bore witness to a modera- 
tion, a courage, a political sense and insight which have 
not received their due meed of praise. "All these men 
deserve our consideration. Some are to be pitied; others 
must be given time to come back to us. All must be 
enlightened; and we must not allow to degenerate into 
selfish or factious quarrels differences of opinion which are 
inseparable from the weakness of human nature, which 
result from the multitude of aspects presented by very 
complicated affairs, and whose diversity is in itself good 
and useful for the State. . . . We have already to con- 
gratulate ourselves on several fortunate and peaceful 
victories. Not a day passes on which some who at first 
held aloof come over to our side. Not a day passes on 
which the horizons of truth do not broaden, and the dawn 

190 



THE STATES -GENERAL 

of reason does not come for some who have hitherto been 
dazzled rather than enhghtened by its very radiance." 

These fine words are stamped with an incomparable 
wisdom, and in them Mirabeau appears to have fore- 
seen the admirable impulse of enthusiasm which led the 
two higher orders to complete the sacrifice of their 
privileges on the night of August 4. Mirabeau's father 
had died on July 10, and a family gathering prevented 
him from being present at the immortal scene. M. de La 
Marck asserts that he disapproved of it, and even described 
it as "an orgy," and Dumont attributes to him a curious 
observation on the subject. " How characteristic this is of 
the French," he is said to have observed; "they spend a 
whole month arguing about words, and in a single night 
they overturn the whole ancient order of the monarchy." 
The testimony of these witnesses agree too well not to 
contain a certain amount of truth. But it is certainly 
excessive to contend that Mirabeau regretted the abolition 
of the feudal regime. His criticism was directed only to 
the haste with which it was carried out. The suppression 
of the old order was, in fact, rather proclaimed than 
executed, and it left room both for repentance and for legal 
difficulties. The Courrier de Provence, which had become 
his organ, went no further than this, and if he himself, in 
a letter which he afterwards wrote to the Bailli, deplored 
the precipitation with which the step had been taken, he 
defended the Assembly against the reproach of having 
exceeded its powers. 

For the rest he expressed his views in the tribune, and 
on August 7 he opposed unsuccessfully an amendment of 
Clermont-Tonnerre, which reserved the King's hunting 
rights outside his domains. 

On August 10 he spoke energetically in favour of the 
abolition of tithes. It was on this occasion that he said 
one of his most celebrated things. Speaking of the clergy, 
he was observing that tithe was a subsidy paid by the 

191 



MIRABEAU 

nation as wages to the guardians of morality and educa- 
tion, when he was interrupted by murmurs in the House. 
Without flinching he replied, "I hear much murmuring 
at the word ' wages,' and one would think that it was an 
insult to the priesthood. But, gentlemen, it is high time 
in the course of this Revolution, which is bringing to 
birth so many just and generous sentiments, that we 
should abjure the prejudices of pride and ignorance which 
despise the words ' wage ' and ' wage-earner.' I know 
only three ways of living in society — a man may beg, he 
may steal, or he may earn. Is not the proprietor himself 
the chief wage-earner of all ? " 

Finally, on September i8, Mirabeau supported with 
irresistible force of argument Le Chapelier's motion that 
the decrees of August 4 should be promulgated. "To go 
back on these articles," he said, "would be an act alike 
irregular, impolitic and impossible." This view is clear 
enough to show how impossible it is to maintain that 
Mirabeau was against the decisions taken on that 
memorable night. 

With Mirabeau more than any other statesman it is a 
mistake to confound his theory with his practice. His 
sense of reality sometimes led him to subordinate the 
former to the latter, and among many examples which 
might be quoted, none is more interesting than his attitude 
on the question of the Declaration of the Rights of Man. 
Here, again, he has been curiously misconceived and mis- 
construed by those who have studied him too hastily, and 
perhaps without reference to original documents. It is 
indeed a singular paradox which would separate him from 
one of the most durable acts of the Constituent Assembly, 
which was passed with practical unanimity, and the con- 
sequences of which have had their effect on governments 
which have nothing in common with the Revolution. 

On July 12 La Fayette, full of the memories of his 
glorious expedition to America, had submitted to the 

192 



THE STATES -GENERAL 

Assembly a draft Declaration of Rights. Mirabeau's 
nineteenth letter to his constituents described it as "bring- 
ing the principles of liberty from the study of the philo- 
sopher out of the domain of metaphysical abstractions in 
order to bring them within the reach of the people, and 
to consecrate them in their eyes by a national sanction." 
The letter recognized all the great principles expressed in 
the Declaration, but pointed out that the detached maxims 
composing the draft, "in order tO' obtain their full force 
should be linked together and developed as resulting from 
a single truth." In his Addresse aux Bataves Mirabeau 
had tried to link up and develop these principles precisely 
in this way. He had concluded by giving a table of 
rights which belong "to all men, and such that without 
them it is impossible for the human race in any country 
to preserve its dignity, to perfect itself or to enjoy in 
tranquillity the gifts of nature." These rights he pro- 
claimed as "anterior and superior to all conventions," and 
"as inalienable and indefeasible." He declared that it was 
absurd to subordinate them to a written code, and regarded 
them as "the common and eternal basis of all political 
association." 

The state of mind revealed by these categorical affirma- 
tions dominated the Constituent Assembly. All its mem- 
bers felt the need, powerfully expressed by Mounier, of 
substituting for "the scattered, doubtful and unstable 
authority " of the old French constitution a new regirne 
which should distribute power and regulate privileges. A 
Committee of five members, including Mirabeau, who was 
made reporter, were appointed to draw up a Declaration. 
His earlier work and his opinions, which had prepared 
him for the task, also warned him of the difficulties. A 
little later, on the occasion of another debate, he recalled 
the discussion to which the Declaration had given 
rise, and observed, "We are not savages come from the 
banks of the Orinoco to form a society. We are an old 
o 193 



MIRABEAU 

nation, too old, indeed, for the age. We have a pre- 
existing Government, a pre-existing King, pre-existing 
prejudices. As far as is possible we must adjust all 
these things to the Revolution, and avoid too sudden a 
transition." 

This reserve, which from the constitutional point of view 
is so profoundly true, had not the same force in regard 
to the rights "natural, inalienable, indefeasible," which 
Mirabeau could not dream of refusing to Frenchmen after 
having offered the same blessings to the Batavians. Never- 
theless, a serious difficulty arose from the pre-existence 
of "a body politic, old and almost decrepit." The Report 
presented by Mirabeau in the name of the Committee at 
the sitting of August 17, betrayed and even avowed real 
embarrassment. Duroveray, Clavi^re, and Dumont had 
collaborated in "this piece of marquetry," with which 
Mirabeau was far from being satisfied. The draft, which 
he offered with "extreme diffidence," contained nineteen 
articles. The work had been too hastily done, and in it 
there were things good, bad and indifferent, a mixture of 
confusion and audacity, of Rousseau and Quesnay, but 
nothing of the brevity and clearness which are indispens- 
able in a Declaration of this kind. Nothing finally 
survived of it but the preamble. 

The Assembly did not give the proposed articles the 
approval which the reporter himself hesitated to claim. 
The discussion, which was uncertain and halting, sug- 
gested to Mirabeau the idea which he expressed on his 
own personal responsibility, to postpone drawing up the 
Declaration of Rights until such time as the other portions 
of the Constitution were entirely agreed upon and settled. 
This proposal was received with murmurs. Though from 
the first he had admitted the difficulty of composing a 
Declaration "as a preamble to a Constitution which was 
still unknown," he was accused of contradicting himself. 
Assemblies are apt to yield to the temptation to blame 

194 



THE STATES-GENERAL 

those who endeavour to lead them for their own embar- 
rassments. One deputy, amid applause, denounced "Mira- 
beau's prodigious talent for guiding the Assembly in con- 
trary directions." Another recalled his past. Stung to 
the quick, Mirabeau proudly replied, after deploring the 
errors of "a very stormy youth," that "the allegation that 
I have a talent for guiding you in contrary directions is 
therefore a senseless insult, a gibe aimed at me from below, 
which thirty volumes rebut so completely that it is quite 
beneath my notice." On the main issue he continued to 
affirm, on the one hand, that a Declaration of Rights was 
necessary, but on the other that it would be either insigni- 
ficant or dangerous if it were to precede instead of follow- 
ing the settlement of the Constitution. In support of this 
position he said a thing which is worth remembering in 
order to appreciate the continuity of his views on an all- 
important point. "Either you will never make a Con- 
stitution for France, or you will have to find some means 
of again giving force to the executive and to public 
opinion, before your Constitution is settled." 

The Assembly declined to be stopped by these objec- 
tions, and continued the discussion, justly anxious to 
satisfy a desire which had been more generally and 
urgently expressed than any other. The drafts of 
Mounier and La Fayette were taken as a basis. Mirabeau 
intervened several times either to define the responsibilities 
of the agents of public order, or to protect the liberty 
of the press against an equivocal formula, or to express 
his views on the subject of religious liberty. The last 
point is worth remembering. Mirabeau was opposed to 
the proclamation of a dominant religion, and thought that 
there should be no limit to this liberty but the exigencies 
of public order and tranquillity. Religious liberty in his 
view was a right and not a concession, and there was a 
point of theoretical importance in this distinction. "I 
do not come here," he said, "to preach toleration. In 

195 



MIRABEAU 

my view the utmost freedom of religion is a right so sacred 
that the word toleration, by which it is sought to describe 
it, seems itself to smack of tyranny. For the existence of 
an authority which has the power to tolerate is a menace 
to freedom of thought from the very fact that, having 
power to tolerate, it has also the power not to do so." 
I do not think I am mistaken when I claim that the whole 
theory of religious liberty is contained in this passage, 
which is too little known, the lucidity and precision of 
which does not suffer from its conciseness. 

On August 7 he opposed the privilege which they wished 
to reserve to the King, of hunting outside his own domains, 
but while he condemned this concession to the royal 
pleasure, he announced that he was a firm supporter of 
the royal prerogative. "The royal prerogative," he said, 
"is too valuable in my eyes to allow me to consent to its 
consisting only in a futile and oppressive pastime. When 
the question of the royal prerogative arises I shall show 
at the proper time that it is the most precious safeguard 
of the people, and you shall judge if I rightly apprehend 
its proper extent. And in advance I defy the most honour- 
able of my colleagues to carry religious respect for it 
further than I do." 

In his opinion this prerogative so obviously implied 
the veto, that is to say, the right to refuse sanction, that 
in the discussion on the denomination of the Assembly 
he had asserted that if the King had not this right he 
would rather live at Constantinople than in France. 
"Yes," he exclaimed, "I solemnly assert that I could con- 
ceive nothing more terrible than a sovereign aristocracy 
of six hundred persons who to-morrow might declare them- 
selves irremovable, and the day after hereditary, and who, 
like every aristocracy in every country of the world, would 
end by overrunning everything." Without returning to 
these oft-renewed and quite categorical declarations, it 
would be impossible to judge with impartiality the speech 
which he made in favour of the absolute veto at the sitting 

196 



THE STATES-GENERAL 

of September i. He remained faithful to his opinion, the 
strength of which placed him in opposition to Necker 
himself, who was a supporter of a merely suspensory veto. 
Mirabeau's theory was borrowed from a bizarre and con- 
fused book by the Marquis de Cazaux, entitled Simplicite 
de I'idee d'une Constitution, which he proclaimed to be 
a work of genius, taking from it the greater part of his 
speech. It was a failure. As he read he excited nothing 
but murmurs, to secure applause he had to improvise 
commonplaces against despotism, and he had himself to 
acknowledge his defeat. It would not be of great interest 
to investigate the value of his arguments, but how is his 
attitude to be interpreted? He was against the creation 
of two Chambers, no doubt because, like Rabaut-Saint- 
Etienne, he thought that "the upper house would be 
nothing but the constitutional refuge of the aristocracy 
and the preserve of the feudal system." This reason pro- 
ceeded not so much from principle, but from the circum- 
stances. But from this very fact, and above all in view of 
the character of Louis XVI, whose weakness, in the 
face of the pretensions and intrigues of his Court, had 
been sadly apparent at the sitting of June 23, was there 
not an even stronger objection to the veto of the sovereign ? 
The mistake of the people who thought the veto was a 
person or a tax has seemed ridiculous. But Michelet was 
right when he observed, "There is nothing ridiculous in 
this but the mockers. The veto was, in fact, the same 
thing as a tax if it prevented reform and reduction of 
taxation. The veto was, in fact, extremely personal; a 
man was to say without giving reasons, ' I forbid,' and 
that was to be the end of it." 

Mirabeau required his revenge, and vSOon obtained it 
with a power of argument and a brilliancy of language in 
which he surpassed himself. It was on the occasion of 
the discussion of the financial situation. But before this 
crucial debate, in which he gained immortal glory, he 
performed an important service to the Assembly in 

197 



MIRABEAU 

opposing the proposal of M. de Volney, who demanded 
that the Constituent Assembly should be dissolved, and 
that the members should not be re-eligible. Against dis- 
solution he was not content to remind them of the oath of 
the Jeu de Paume, which bound the deputies to remain at 
their posts until after the Constitution was voted. He 
pointed out that the very mistakes of the Assembly would 
give them experience which would enable them to open 
by common consent a new era of peace and goodwill. 
"If," he said, "we put other deputies in our place, the first 
moment might well be the moment of an outbreak of war." 
Against the proposal that they should not be eligible for 
re-election he invoked the nation's sovereign rights. "We 
should be giving orders to the nation ! In elections hence- 
forth there would be another principle than that of con- 
fidence and free choice. Let us never forget that it is our 
duty to consult but not to dominate public opinion ! " 
This exalted wisdom, so prudent and so prophetic, pre- 
vailed against the unreflecting impulse of disinterested 
modesty which had been aroused in all quarters of the 
House by Volney 's motion. As is only too well known, 
the inspiration of this speech did not survive the orator. 
When the Assembly was deprived of his insight and was 
no longer dominated by his courage in seeing and pro- 
claiming where their duty lay, the Constituent Assembly 
committed the irreparable blunder from which the great 
tribune had saved it. 

In the same speech of September 19 Mirabeau agreed 
on behalf of the Finance Committee that the Assembly 
should devote two days a week to the consideration of 
financial questions. The urgency of the matter had never 
escaped him. "It is the public debt," he said on April 24, 
"which was the germ of our liberties." This terse saying 
throws a flood of light on the long-standing and deep- 
seated causes of the Revolution which are well known to 
history. The deficit had led to the States-General, and 

198 



THE STATES-GENERAL 

through them to the proclamation of a new order of things. 
But Hberty, necessary as it was and now secured in public 
matters, was not in itself sufficient to solve the fiscal 
problem. Necker seemed to be more and more unequal 
to his task. Moreover, whatever he might do, Mirabeau 
was unable to make up his mind to give him his con- 
fidence. For a proposal to borrow thirty millions he tried 
unsuccessfully on April 8 to substitute another whereby, in 
order to save the rights of the nation, the deputies sub- 
scribed an engagement to guarantee the sum personally. 
The loan was voted at 4J per cent, and did not succeed. 
Mirabeau pointed out the mistake the Assembly had made 
in imposing on the Minister a rate which was lower than 
in the case of other public funds. He brushed aside "vain 
declamations against financiers, men of business, bankers 
and capitalists," and he twice (August 17 and 24) pro- 
claimed the necessity, which was becoming more and 
more imperious, of guaranteeing the security of the 
National Debt against all attack. 

The situation having grown worse, Necker proposed on 
September 24, among other measures, a voluntary and 
patriotic contribution equivalent to a quarter of the 
revenue. This was a mere expedient, but what was to 
be done? To reject it was impossible. "The revenues 
of the State were annihilated, the Treasury was empty, the 
forces of the State were bankrupt." To modify it meant 
to lose precious time in examining the whole resources 
and necessities of the State, and to check figures the bare 
verification of which threatened to take months. The only 
course seemed to be to accept, and it was justified both 
by the gravity of the circumstances and by the confidence 
which the nation had in the Minister. On behalf of the 
Committee of Finance Mirabeau supported Necker's pro- 
posals, which he asked the Assembly to adopt, but not to 
guarantee, as there was neither the time nor the means 
to criticize them. If they succeeded, so much the better, 

199 



MIRABEAU 

for the Assembly, whose consent had prepared the way. 
If they failed, the Assembly would at least keep its credit 
intact and ready for public emergencies. "Let us take a 
more optimistic view," said Mirabeau. "Let us decree 
the proposals of the first Minister of Finance, and believe 
that his genius, aided by the resources of the finest king- 
dom in the world, and the fervent zeal of an Assembly 
which has set, and should still set, such splendid examples, 
will show itself equal to the needs of the time." 

Convinced by this pressing language, the Assembly 
directed Mirabeau to draw up a draft decree in this sense. 
Mirabeau, on the one hand, admitted the impossibility of 
making a profound and detailed examination, and on the 
other pointed to "the boundless confidence reposed in 
the experience and ability of this Minister by the whole 
nation." Mme. de Stael describes this attitude on the 
part of Mirabeau as "astute"; M. A. de Lameth em- 
phasizes what he regards as its " malignity "^ in the 
Assembly it produced a mixture of impressions. The 
"provisional dictatorship" which Mirabeau was conferring 
on a Minister whose person and whose plans he had never 
spared seemed suspicious. Some accused him of flattering 
Necker, others of trying to compromise him. He explained 
himself with much frankness and loyalty in a second 
speech. He did not deny that he rated the credit of the 
National Assembly higher than that of the Minister of 
Finance, or that he would have preferred other plans (in 
particular an obligatory contribution wisely arranged) to 
the uncertainties of a voluntary levy. But "this opinion, 
like any other, lacks the force of proof. I may be wrong, 
and I have not had the time to discover for certain whether 
I am wrong or right." His conclusion was that "for the 
sake of the country " Necker's project should be adopted, 
and in a vehement peroration he adjured his colleagues 
to sacrifice "all rancour, hatred and distrust on the altar of 
the public good." 

200 



THE STATES -GENERAL 

Nevertheless, the Assembly still hesitated, and various 
motions were submitted. How were they to be convinced ? 
For the third time Mirabeau ascended the tribune. Having 
said all, what could he add ? Any other man might have 
run the risk of compromising his case by repetition. But 
he, magnificent, impetuous, exalted by the very difficulties 
of the situation and his task, repeated himself only to 
renew and surpass his previous efforts. His exordium was 
familiar and urgent in tone, and put the question which 
dominated the case, "Have you a plan to substitute for that 
proposed to us by the Minister ?" An isolated, anonymous, 
and imprudent "Yes! " was the reply. The interruption 
was fortunate for the orator. He seized upon it, retorted 
it, dislocated and refuted it, and after its annihilation he 
returned to Necker's plan. Once again he proclaimed its 
inevitable necessity, and penetrating designs which could 
not be avowed, but which existed in certain wavering 
minds, he pronounced "the infamous word ' bankruptcy.' " 
From that moment the tone of his speech changed. It 
became like the announcement of a revelation, the revela- 
tion of a secret, the explanation of a mystery. " My friends, 
hear one word, one single word," and with this he led 
his attentive, breathless and anxious audience to the verge 
of "the appalling gulf dug by two centuries of depreda- 
tions and robberies." "This gulf must be filled. Well! 
Here is the list of landed proprietors in France. Choose 
the richest in order that fewer citizens may be sacrificed. 
But choose ! for is it not necessary that a few should perish 
in order to save the mass of the people ? . . . Strike ! 
Sacrifice these trembling victims without pity : cast them 
into the abyss and it will close. You shrink back with 
horror ! Most inconsequent and pusillanimous of men ! " 
Was not bankruptcy an act a thousand times more 
criminal — bankruptcy which would rouse to a terrible 
explosion of fury millions and millions of men ? Im- 
poverished, deceived and ruined, what was not to be feared 

201 



MIRABEAU 

from their just resentment and anger? "Stoical contem- 
plators of the incalculable ruin to be vomited over France 
by such a catastrophe; impassible egotists who think that 
these convulsions of despair and misery will pass as so 
many others have passed, and all the more speedily as they 
will be more violent — are you quite sure that so many 
men without bread will leave you to the tranquil enjoyment 
of the rich repasts which you refuse to reduce in quantity 
or in delicacy ? Nay, you will perish, and in the universal 
conflagration which you do not fear to light the loss of 
your honour will not save a single one of your detestable 
sensualities ! " The House shuddered at this terrifying 
and brutal picture. His hearers lost all power of judging 
or deciding for themselves. They were cowed by an all- 
powerful genius; they were dominated and carried away. 
He spoke no more to them of principle and of liberty. 
With an audacious realism which does not seek to dis- 
simulate, he appealed "to the most ordinary prudence, to 
the most trivial common sense," to the most vulgar self- 
interest. Even from this point of view there was room 
for neither hesitation nor delay. "Beware how you ask for 
time; misfortune never permits procrastination. Why, 
gentlemen, when there was lately some trifling commotion 
at the Palais Royal, a ridiculous insurrection which never 
had any importance except in the feeble imagination or the 
perverse designs of some perfidious men, you heard the 
words ' Catiline is at the gates of Rome, and you still 
deliberate ! ' And yet it was not Rome, and we were 
beset neither by Catiline, nor by any serious danger or 
faction. But to-day bankruptcy in all its horror stares us 
in the face, and threatens to consume you and your pro- 
perties and your honour, and you deliberate ! " At these 
words the Assembly rose "as if they suddenly saw the 
abyss of the deficit open at their feet demanding victims." ^ 
A vote was taken, the decree was carried with enthusiasm, 

^ Ferri^res. 
202 



THE STATES-GENERAL 

and Mirabeau seemed to the House to be a unique being 
whose eloquence could never be rivalled. Friends and 
foes bowed before the superiority of his genius. Necker's 
daughter, Mme. de Stael, was vanquished by his "im- 
pressive" voice, by his biting words, by his "prodigious 
life and power," and when in later days she calmly recalled 
the unforgettable memory of that day, she followed Garat 
in summing it up in ^schines's remark about Demo- 
sthenes, "What would you think if you had yourself seen 
the portent ? " 

On Mirabeau's proposition the Assembly had decided to 
send the address to the people, to explain to them the 
measures taken, and to appeal to its enthusiasm and sense 
of honour. The illustrious orator was charged with the 
duty of drawing it up. He could not do everything, and, 
moreover, was in the habit of relying on collaborators. He 
therefore passed on the duty to Dumont. The draft was 
read at the sitting of October 2 ; it was an enfeebled and 
declamatory echo of Mirabeau's speeches, and it had less 
effect on the people than they had had on the House. In 
the precipitate course of events men's minds were already 
turned in another direction. Indignation had been roused 
by the news that on the previous day at a banquet to the 
bodyguard, at the end of which the King and Queen had 
imprudently been present, the white cockade had been 
noisily paraded instead of the tricolour. These scenes 
were renewed two days later, with details which aggravated 
the audacity of the counter-revolutionaries. If not the 
reason, they were at least one of the pretexts which pro- 
voked the exodus of part of the populace of Paris to 
Versailles on October 5 and 6, the invasion of the palace, 
and the King's enforced return to Paris. The real cause 
of this brief insurrection remains very obscure, and it is 
difficult to discover who were the responsible and guilty 
parties. Was it a spontaneous outburst of popular irrita- 
tion, distrust and impatience? Was it a plot of the Due 

203 



MIRABEAU * 

d'Orleans against the Court, and especially against 
the Queen, whom he hated? Was it a desperate con- 
spiracy fomented by the partisans of the ancien regime 
against the Revolution, which by its very excesses was 
intended to provoke a sanguinary repression ? Or was 
it an unforeseen combination of all these elements ? 
Each historian has his theory based upon evidence or 
prejudice. 

Mirabeau's participation in these days of bloodshed 
and anarchy, whether in the interest of the Due d'Orleans 
or for his own purposes, raises the same contradictions. 
Mounier is his chief accuser. In spite of the weight 
attaching to such a name, history has pronounced against 
him, and has adopted the opinion loyally expressed by 
Mallet du Pan, one of Mirabeau's most passionate oppon- 
ents. Ten years after the event he wrote that "after trying 
for long to penetrate the mystery of October 6, after com- 
paring accounts of all kinds and gathering authoritative 
testimony he had convinced himself that Mirabeau had 
no share either in the premeditation or in the execution 
of this crime, the mingled threads of which will never be 
clearly unravelled." The proceedings opened by the 
Chatelet gave Mirabeau himself the opportunity of 
making a personal explanation in a speech which he 
delivered on October 2, 1790. He never displayed more 
dignity or moderation, more logical clearness or more alert, 
witty or delightful cleverness. It is impossible not to 
accept as convincing the account which he gave. To this 
defence M. de La Marck has added his unquestioned testi- 
mony by stating that Mirabeau spent the greater part of 
October 5 with him studying the troubles in Brabant and 
also by placing in a clear light his friend's relations with 
the Due d'Orleans. I therefore hold that the case against 
Mirabeau presented by Mounier, who after October 6 fled 
before the Revolution which he had courageously pro- 
moted, has been decided finally in Mirabeau's favour, 

204 



THE STATES-GENERAL 

and I do not think it necessary to go into any further 
historical details. 

But it is not enough to say that Mirabeau took no part 
direct or indirect in the events of October 5 and 6. We 
must add that he was never in the confidence, still less in 
the pay, of the Due d'Orl6ans. The mediocrity of the 
Prince, his timidity and indecision, never inspired any 
confidence in Mirabeau. His own plans were too vast, too 
well thought out and too serious to allow him to associate 
so irresolute a character with their execution. If (which 
is more than doubtful) he thought for a moment of making 
him Lieutenant-General of the Kingdom it was only for a 
moment. Could he have asked such a man for money ? 
Could he even have accepted it from him? M. de La 
Marck did his best to destroy by citing a simple fact the 
imputation which is sufficiently rebutted by Mirabeau's 
prudence, leaving his scruples out of account. " Mirabeau 
has been accused of putting his hand into the coffers of the 
Due d'Orl^ans, and it was at the very moment when 
these treasures were being showered upon him when he 
came to me in a timid and embarrassed way, asking for 
the loan of a few louis ! " The same witness adds that 
some days before the events of October the Due d 'Orleans 
and Mirabeau dined with him, and that he particularly 
noticed that there was between them "so much reserve that 
the idea of a secret understanding between them was out 
of the question." Completely free in this quarter, Mira- 
beau was looking and acting elsewhere. It was his rela- 
tions with the Comte de Provence and with La Fayette 
which marked the second period of his career in the 
National Assembly. In this new phase the orator persisted 
and transformed himself without falling below himself, 
but he now aspired to statesmanship. 



205 



CHAPTER XIII 

FROM THE EVENTS OF OCTOBER 1 789 TO THE TREATY 
WITH THE COURT 

The Comte de La Marck — Memorandum by Mirabeau (October 15, 1789) 
— La Fayette — Mirabeau wishes to become a Minister — The Comte 
de Provence : projected treaty with the Court — Mirabeau against 
Cazal^s and Robespierre. 

MiCHELET has written that after the terrible awakening of 
the events of October, "the two leading men in France, 
the most popular and the most eloquent, La Fayette and 
Mirabeau, returned to Paris royalists." That was true 
of La Fayette. The part he had played during the course 
of those tragic events, the fear of delivering the young 
Revolution up to excesses which would be its ruin, the 
heroic protection he had given Marie Antoinette on the 
balcony of the palace of Versailles in the sight of a mob 
that was at first amazed and then charmed and delighted, 
had brought the Republican general of the American War 
over to the monarchy. Mirabeau stood in no need of con- 
version. He had never ceased to be an avowed royalist. 
His most revolutionary speeches had admitted the necessity 
for a firmly established constitutional monarchy. But the 
inertia which vitiated the King's best intentions, the 
Queen's resistance, the intrigues of the Court, alarmed his 
patriotism and disquieted his monarchical faith. He 
feared the worst. On the day following the events of 
June 23, he said indignantly to jfetienne Dumont, "Such 
things lead kings to the scaffold." Later, about the end 
of September, speaking of the Court, he declared in the 
presence of M.de La Marck, "What are these people think- 
ing of? Don't they see the abyss opening at their feet? 

206 



THE TREATY WITH THE COURT 

All is lost : the King and Queen will perish and the mob 
will trample their bodies underfoot ! " 

This terrible prediction alarmed M. de La Marck. He 
was an Austrian nobleman of the Arenberg family, which 
was one of the most ancient and illustrious princely houses 
in Europe. A brilliant officer, a colonel in a Languedoc 
regiment, he had come to France shortly after the marriage 
of the Dauphin. His family and the protection of the 
Empress Maria Theresa had assured him a distinguished 
position at Court. He was admitted to Marie Antoinette's 
intimate circle. A keen observer, absolutely disinterested, 
obliging, faithful and loyal, he closely followed the events 
that were moving so swiftly in France. He had made 
Mirabeau's acquaintance in 1788 at a dinner given by the 
Prince de Poix, Governor of Versailles. The impression 
made on him then is worth quoting, as it gives us one 
of the best portraits ever drawn of the renowned tribune : 
"When he saw Mirabeau enter, M. de La Marck was 
struck by his appearance. He was tall, squarely and 
heavily built. His head, which was extraordinarily large, 
was made even larger by a vast mass of curled and 
powdered hair. He wore a town coat with very large 
buttons of coloured stone, and shoe-buckles of an equally 
exaggerated size. His whole costume was marked by 
an exaggeration of the fashion of the time, which suited 
but ill with the taste of the men of the Court. His features 
were disfigured with pock-marks. The expression of his 
countenance was sombre, but his eyes were full of fire. In 
his desire for elegance he exaggerated his salutations : his 
first words were ponderous and vulgar compliments. In 
a word he had neither the manners nor the speech of the 
society in which he found himself, and although by birth 
he was the peer qf his hosts, yet it was easy to see by his 
manners that he lacked the ease which comes from fre- 
quenting the great world." 

Mirabeau's conversation, copious and powerful, witty and 

207 



MIRABEAU 

brilliant, fortunately compensated for what was ridiculous 
and second-rate in his bearing. His views on Germany, full 
of sound ideas, and eloquently expressed, delighted M. 
de La Marck. They became friends. The meeting of the 
States-General, in which M. de La Marck represented the 
bailiwick of Quesnay, brought together the two men, who 
in spite of many divergencies of taste and opinion, had 
so much in common, and set up a warm and confident 
sympathy between them. M. de La Marck soon saw how 
Mirabeau's genius and popularity could be turned to 
account. Rejected by the Government, misunderstood 
and despised by the Court, conscious of his power and 
impatient for action, Mirabeau had no hesitation in saying, 
"On the day when the King's ministers will bring them- 
selves to discuss matters with me they will find me devoted 
to the Royal cause and the safety of the monarchy." These 
words led M. de La Marck to approach the Keeper of the 
Seals, M. de Cice, Archbishop of Bordeaux, but without 
result. He was not discouraged, and, understanding with 
rare insight the gravity of what had happened, he did 
not hesitate to turn to the Queen. Marie Antoinette 
told him bluntly that she was not of his opinion: "We 
shall never be so unfortunate, I think, as to be reduced 
to the painful extremity of turning to Mirabeau for 
help." 

Meanwhile the Revolution took its course : Mirabeau 
was always in the foreground. On October 5 he had pro- 
tested in moderate terms, as he demanded the necessary 
explanation, against the letter in which the King had 
accepted with reservations the constitutional decrees and 
adjourned the sanction of the Declaration of the Rights 
of Man : he had especially insisted on every act of the 
King's being accompanied by the signature of a Secretary 
of State : "for without it the salutary law of responsibility 
will always be set at nought." 

P6tion had denounced the banquet of the bodyguard. 

208 



THE TREATY WITH THE COURT 

Mirabeau, without attempting to elucidate "this culpable 
act," proposed to "forbid the guard holding these festivals 
of spurious patriotism, which were an insult to the misery 
of the people and might have fatal consequences." When 
an ill-inspired member of the Right insisted on making 
Petion produce a written denunciation of what had hap- 
pened, Mirabeau declared that he considered such a denun- 
ciation extremely impolitic, but he added : " However, if 
it is insisted on, I am ready to furnish all the details and 
to sign them ; but first I shall ask this Assembly to declare 
that the King's person is alone inviolable, and that all 
other persons whatsoever are equally subject and respon- 
sible to the law." This exposed the Queen, and these 
menacing words must have rung dolorously in her ears and 
revealed to her the power of the man she despised. 

When the Assembly was invaded Mirabeau protested 
against the scandal, and forced the President to clear the 
hall to save the dignity of debate. So great was his popu- 
larity at that time that he was applauded even by those 
whom he insisted on expelling. He procured the rejec- 
tion of the proposal that the Assembly should sit in the 
.King's presence. "It is not fitting to our dignity," he 
declared ; " it is not even wise to desert our posts at a time 
when imaginary or real dangers are threatening the public 
good." Finally, on hearing that the King had returned 
to Paris, he procured a decree that "the King and the 
Assembly should be inseparable during the present 
session." "Let me point out to the Assembly," he said, 
"that a sound policy should lead it to promulgate an act of 
such importance without hesitation." 

Thus, during these two days, Mirabeau once more appeared 
in his twofold capacity : moderate and enthusiastic, ener- 
getic and far-seeing, a defender of the rights of the people, 
whose excesses he condemned, indulgent with the King, 
whom he knew to be more hesitating than ill-intentioned, 
hard on the imprudence of the Court, whose temerity too 
P 209 



MIRABEAU 

nearly resembled defiance. The day after the King's 
enforced return to the Tuileries he went to see M. de La 
Marck. "The King, the royal family, France too," he 
said, "are lost if the royal family does not leave Paris. 
I am evolving a plan to make them go : would it be 
possible for you to go and assure them that they can count 
on me ? " A few days later he produced this plan, dated 
October 15. It is a capital piece of work, as strong in its 
general conception as it is clear, sober, eloquent in expres- 
sion. Mirabeau's ideas were expressed in it with a frank- 
ness and confidence which prove his sincerity. Although 
to abstract it may weaken it, yet it is too long to be cited 
in full : and I may at least try, without falsifying its spirit 
to present its essential details. 

What was Mirabeau's aim ? To assure the success of 
the Revolution, and bring it peacefully to a head, to allow 
the King to form a "coalition" with his people. What- 
ever the deplorable mistakes committed by the National 
Assembly in its misdirected, ill-composed form, its lack of 
experience and excess of numbers, it did render services of 
inestimable value. It was still sustained by the gratitude 
and hopes of the people. In reality there had been in its 
blunders more "mistakes in administration than in prin- 
ciple." The exemptions and privileges which, backed by 
universal opinion, it had destroyed, could never come to 
life again : the whole nation would rise up against them. 
"The abolition of the feudal system was an expiation due 
to ten centuries of madness." The Assembly must, there- 
fore, be preserved, for the people found it good. But 
neither the King nor the Assembly were free. The 
"excited populace," which had brought them back to Paris, 
would continue to dominate them by the "anarchical 
tyranny," to which the weakness of ministers without 
authority as instruments had given rein. How then was 
peace to be restored to the State, power to the army, the 
power of action to the executive, its true rights to the 

210 



THE TREATY WITH THE COURT 

monarchy, the rights which were indispensable to pubUc 
liberty ? 

Certain worse than bad solutions, which would bring 
about the most frightful consequences and the inevitable 
ruin of the King, must at once be discarded. To retire 
to Metz or any other place on the frontier would be to 
declare war on the nation and abdicate the throne. A 
King, who is the only safeguard of his people, does not 
fly before his people. He accepts his people as the judge 
of his conduct and principles, but he does not suddenly 
break all the ties which bind them to him, nor stir up 
disaffection, nor place himself in the position of only being 
able to return to the seat of his Government armed, nor 
will he be reduced to craving help from abroad." Mirabeau 
adds: "If such a thing were to happen, I would myself 
denounce the monarch." 

It would be no less dangerous to withdraw to the interior 
of the kingdom, appeal to the nobility and make alliance 
with them. That would mean choosing between a great 
people and a few individuals whom that people regarded 
as their most implacable enemies. 

Discarding such expedients, "it being impossible to 
think of evading a great danger without danger," the 
King's departure was the last resort for the public good 
and his own safety. From the military, political and 
economical point of view Rouen would be the most suit- 
able town. The departure would be carefully planned and 
would take place openly. The King would plead the 
necessity for regaining his liberty in order to approach 
his people more nearly, and to deprive the malcontents 
of any excuse for disregarding the authority of the 
Assembly's decrees. He would proclaim that he took no 
less interest in the Revolution than Ihe most ardent friends 
of liberty; that he, as the head of the nation, had planned 
to invest it with all its rights; that, without exception or 
reservation, he renewed the sanction and adherence he had 

211 



MIRABEAU 

given to the decrees of the Assembly ; that the pubHc debt 
was pledged by the national honour, that the Parlements 
were definitely abolished, and, finally, that, desiring to live 
the life of a private individual, he would henceforth be 
content with a million for his personal and family expenses. 

The Assembly would be invited to attend upon the 
monarch, from whom it had declared its inseparability, 
and, if it refused, it would be replaced by another legisla- 
ture. Proclamations, instructions, correspondence would 
enlighten public opinion, and "it would soon be seen what 
respect and affection for a good Prince can do for a faith- 
ful and generous nation, than whose welfare nothing has 
ever been desired by the Prince, who is himself as unhappy 
as his people." 

This "plan for the public safety," which rested on the 
indivisibility of the monarch and the people, was entrusted 
by M. de La Marck to Monsieur the Comte de Provence, 
the King's brother, to be laid before the Court. Monsieur 
made certain reservations as to the methods of execution, 
but approved of the general scheme. But he refused to 
communicate it to the Queen, and no doubt he did not 
inform the King either, for he was afraid of his 
irresolution. 

Thus repulsed, rejected or misunderstood by those whose 
safety he was concerned to preserve, seeing in their safety 
the fate of the nation involved, Mirabeau had reason to 
believe that another resource was open to him. He did 
not like or respect La Fayette, whose quasi-dictatorship 
did not seem to him to be justified by the intellectual gifts 
or the character that he most prized. But he could not 
shut his eyes to the fact that the general's popularity was 
a formidable weapon. For his part, La Fayette was filled 
with very strong prejudices against Mirabeau based on the 
Tribune's youthful vagaries. 

The departure of the Due d'Orleans, forced on the 
Prince by La Fayette after the events of Octoberj violently 

212 



THE TREATY WITH THE COURT 

irritated Minabeau, who thought such despotism most 
imprudent. There was very nearly an explosion. Dupont, 
Alexander de Lameth and Barnave intervened and de- 
manded an interview, which took place in their presence 
at Passy in the house of Mme. d'Aragon, Mirabeau's 
niece. There was a discussion of the general situation, 
which gave rise to many fears, and of the weakness of the 
Ministry, which seemed impotent to face the position. 
They agreed as to the necessity of finding a substitute for 
Necker in the Government, and also of replacing many 
of his colleagues with members chosen from the Assembly 
to the exclusion of all the deputies present. Mirabeau is 
reported by Lameth to have said : "In this instance I have 
not the honour of self-sacrifice, for I know that I have 
raised a mountain of prejudice against me which it will take 
time to demolish." Other names were discussed and 
chosen. But the project came to nothing, either because 
La Fayette hesitated to move against Necker, or be- 
cause he could not succeed in overcoming the King's 
opposition. 

Thenceforward for three or four weeks there were 
continued relations between Mirabeau and La Fayette, 
dinners, conversations, discussions, plans. Mirabeau at 
first tried to approach Necker and Montmorin, and had a 
long interview with them which produced no result. 
Everything, both in the attitude of the Ministry and that 
of the Court, led him to La Fayette. M. de La Marck, who 
had not renounced his desire to turn his friend's genius 
to account; M. Talon, the Civil Lieutenant of the Chatelet, 
who wanted to become a minister; M. de Cic6, the Keeper 
of the Seals, who was calmly betraying his colleagues, and 
M. de Semonville, a deputy, were all mixed up in nego- 
tiations of which it is difficult to discover the thread. 
Mirabeau's public influence was shown on October 19 
when, during the first sitting of the Assembly at the 
Abbaye, he procured a vote of thanks to Bailly and 

213 



MIRABEAU 

La Fayette for the attitude adopted by those "virtuous 
citizens " during the recent disturbances. Two days later, 
on the occasion of a vote on suppHes, Mirabeau drew up 
an attack on the Ministry. 

He was in great financial straits. "I find it hard to 
move," he wrote on October 21 to M. de La Marck. "I 
am hemmed in by minor obUgations which in the mass 
are a solid wall. I am very much hampered in my social 
intercourse, both because I cannot look after my affairs, 
and because as long as I have any ambitious project I 
cannot break up my factory. I cannot accept any solid 
assistance without some office that would make it legiti- 
mate : any small loan would only gratuitously compromise 
me. . . ." He received a loan of 50,000 francs, partly 
from La Fayette, which he repaid. As for the office, this 
took the form of the promise of a great ambassadorship to 
Holland or England, on which M. de Montmorin adhered. 

Mirabeau preferred a post in the Ministry to an embassy. 
La Fayette was hostile at first, but visibly weakened. 
It appears that about the end of October he had made up 
his mind to agree, and Mirabeau had reason to believe that 
his dreams were about to be realized. There are two draft 
ministries drawn up in his hand. He appears by name in 
one. Necker was to be Prime Minister, "because he must 
be made as powerless as he is incapable ; and yet preserve 
his popularity with the King." La Fayette was to go to the 
Council, become Marshal of France, and commander-in- 
chief, so as to reconstruct the army ; Mirabeau himself was 
to be appointed to the King's Council, but to have no de- 
partment. His way of judging the reasons for and conse- 
quences of his nomination is curious: "Minor scruples of 
respect of persons," he says, "are no longer in season. The 
Government must openly declare that its chief assistants 
will henceforth be sound principles, character and talent." 
What has become of the heaped-up prejudices which for 
so long had set an insurmountable barrier round Mira- 

214 



THE TREATY WITH THE COURT 

beau ? A little time and much skill had been enough to 
demolish them. The second draft, which distinguishes 
between La Fayette and the Queen, in which also Talley- 
rand and Siey^s figure, does not contain Mirabeau's name, 
but there is no doubt that he had assigned himself the same 
part as in the first. 

"Reciprocal confidence and friendship: that is what I 
give and look for," he wrote to La Fayette on October 29. 
He added, underlining the words : " What would you say 
in case Necker threatened to go if Mirabeau were ap- 
pointed? Give your mind to it." This letter proves 
conclusively the support given by the General to a 
Ministry which would include the Tribune. 

These negotiations did not take up the whole of Mira- 
beau's time, and he was careful not to neglect the Assembly 
where, he knew, his greatest power lay. He took part in 
several discussions. On October 14, the day after an 
unjust' attack in which he had mistakenly implicated the 
Comte de Saint-Priest, a Minister of State, he proposed a 
law relating to riotous meetings, so as to prevent disorder, 
which not only "might have the most fatal results on the 
liberty and safety of citizens," but were also likely to 
"compromise union and the stability of the monarchy." 
Mirabeau clearly never let slip an opportunity for bringing 
together and associating the two great interests to which 
he had with equal zeal devoted himself. His scheme, 
combined with Target's, took shape after the assassina- 
tion of the baker Francois (October 20), in the famous 
martial law. Before it was put to the vote, Mirabeau 
made an observation which reveals his most constant pre- 
occupation, about preserving "against the annihilation," 
the executive power to which he proposed to give the 
necessary resources and means for becoming active and 
responsible. 

On October 30 he delivered a great speech during the 
important debate opened a few days before by the Bishop 



MIRABEAU 

of Autun's proposal to give the State, in order that it 
might put its finances in order, the property of which he 
claimed that the clergy were not the owners but only the 
usufructuaries. This was carrying to its logical conclu- 
sion the thesis set forth by Turgot in his famous article 
on Fondations in the Ency elope die. Mirabeau did not 
entirely agree, but adopted the essential idea. The speech 
he delivered is admirable in its dialectic and its juridical 
argument, the force of which cannot be denied even by 
those who contest its accuracy and justice. Its style bears 
no resemblance whatever to Mirabeau's usual eloquence. 
No doubt the Tribune called in the pen of one of his 
collaborators who was more fitted than himself to deal 
with such a subject. But he was expressing his own ideas. 
They dominated the decree of the Assembly which placed 
the ecclesiastical property at the disposal of the nation, and 
allotted to every parish priest a minimum annual stipend 
of 1200 francs. 

Meanwhile the negotiations for the constitution of a 
Ministry made no progress. The Keeper of the Seals, 
who deceived everybody, paid Le Pelletier to write the 
celebrated anti-Mirabeau pamphlet, Domine salvum fac 
regem. La Fayette, who was "equally incapable of 
breaking faith and of keeping his word ad tempus" could 
not bring himself to any decision. Such hesitation made 
it possible for a cabal to be formed in the Assembly 
against Mirabeau. He determined to take matters into 
his own hands. The weakness of the Ministry was be- 
coming more and more obvious. It was doubly com- 
promised by the clumsiness of its actions and its deplorable 
inaction. Mirabeau still thought and said forcibly that 
"the National Assembly must be made to transcend its 
own measures." By attacking a Ministry whose indecision 
was as dangerous to royalty as to liberty, he brought his 
principles into line with the designs of his ambition. On 
November 5 in the Assembly he denounced the Grand 

216 



THE TREATY WITH THE COURT 

Provost of Marseilles, whose measures, directed against the 
plotters of sedition, were contrary to the recently promul- 
gated decrees. He blamed the ministers for this situation, 
and pointed out the danger of having an executive power 
which was "hostile to the legislative body instead of 
being auxiliary to it." The conclusions which he had put 
to the vote of the Assembly, which was jealous of its 
prerogative and susceptible to his flattery, came very near 
to being a defiant vote of censure. He was right in 
regarding it as a "battle won." The game, he thought, 
had taken a giant stride. Would La Fayette at last under- 
stand, make up his mind and act ? Mirabeau assured him 
of his "personal fidelity," and asked for ^^ carte blanche 
for the composition of a really powerful Ministry in which 
there would be not the slightest suspicion of tolerance." 
So great was his confidence that he even went so far as 
to give the General to understand "in the hurly-burly 
such a Ministry might even come into being without him." 
Thus prepared for the excitement of Necker's dismissal, 
having made or thinking he had made all his arrangements, 
sure of himself and sure of success, Mirabeau began the 
fight on November 6 by means of what he called a tactical 
evolution. The question of finance was the order of the 
day. He plunged into it with a vehement and skilful 
speech in which he called ministers to account for the 
scarcity of specie, the abuses of the Caisse d'Escompte, the 
insufficiency of the reserve of capital : he declared that the 
"reign of illusions was past," and, among other measures, 
he demanded the establishment of a central treasury in- 
tended only for the debt and under national control. After 
having shown the advantages of such an institution for the 
public credit and the creditors of the State, he asked why 
the nation had not the credit it deserved. He alluded to a 
memorandum of the ministers who, by way of self-defence, 
had revealed all the diseases of the State, and thus given 
rise to dangerous alarms. These "sad misunderstandings " 

217 



MIRABEAU 

would never have been produced if the ministers had not 
been absent from the Assembly, and if the executive power 
and the legislative body, regarding each other as enemies, 
had not been afraid to discuss together all the affairs 
of the nation. Thus under cover of a technical discussion 
and on the occasion of a mere incident, the serious ques- 
tion whether a minister could belong to the National 
Assembly was introduced. Already on September 29 in a 
debate on the responsibility of ministers, Mirabeau had 
touched on it. His paper, the Courrier de Provence, had 
dealt with it several times in a series of remarkable articles. 
The time had come for its solution. Mirabeau applied 
himself to it with as much moderation as force, invoking 
the example of England, displaying the manifold advan- 
tages of an assiduous collaboration between the Assembly 
and ministers chosen from its midst, dismissing "frivolous 
fears, vain phantoms and the suspicious timidity which 
rushes into every trap in its dread of falling into them." 
Among the conclusions which he placed before the 
Assembly the aim of the third was to procure a decision 
that "his Majesty's ministers should be invited to take 
part in the deliberations of the Assembly until the Con- 
stitution should fix the rules to be followed with regard 
to them." 

The motion thus presented formally assured the par- 
ticipation of ministers in the labours of the Assembly, and 
indirectly, but in the affirmative, cut across the question 
whether if ministers were selected from the Assembly they 
could continue to be members of it. There was little 
immediate opposition; it was supported by the Comte de 
Clermont-Tonnere and postponed for a day. This ad- 
journment was enough to destroy the impression produced 
by Mirabeau 's speech and to compromise the success of 
his proposal. Decisions come to in the night are not 
always the best. The cabal formed against Mirabeau had 
regained confidence and audacity. A deputy reminded him 

218 



THE TREATY WITH THE COURT 

that when there had been a discussion on a loan of thirty 
millions, he had asked that the debate should not be con- 
ducted in the presence of ministers. The contradiction 
was, perhaps, only apparent. But the Assembly fastened 
on it. When personal questions arise principles easily lose 
their authority. A young deputy, Lanjuinais, proposing 
the establishment of the incompatibility between the func- 
tions of a minister and the mandate of a representative, 
and the prohibition of the appointment to the Ministry 
of a deputy who has resigned his seat, was aimed directly at 
Mirabeau. "An eloquent genius leads and subjugates 
you. What would he not do if he were a minister?" 
From that moment "brutal, savage hatred" was let loose. 
Mirabeau faced it with admirable courage and address. 
The speech he delivered in opposition to the prohibitive 
motion of Blin and Lanjuinais, in its imperious and deci- 
sive brevity, displays irresistible suppleness and vigour of 
argument. No serious objection could be put forward 
against him. But in all assemblies it only too often 
happens that party passions and personal prejudice 
triumph over the clearest reason. Mirabeau found it so. 
His eloquence and sound sense encountered a resist- 
ance which he could not overcome. The jealousy of the 
triumvirate (was it on that day in his despite that he called 
it the triumgueusat?) found allies in the royalists whom 
the Due de Levis not unjustly reproached with having 
"ruined a project which it was to their interest to help 
to success." When in the face of such a coalition he felt 
that he had lost the game, Mirabeau said with fine irony : 
"Let me propose the amendment, that the suggested exclu- 
sion be confined to M. de Mirabeau, deputy for the com- 
munities of the Seneschalty of Aix." 

None the less his bitterness was great. His ambition 
was not of a vulgar kind. He could not indeed be in- 
sensible to the brilliant rehabilitation worthy of his genius 
and courage, which a place in the Ministry would have 

219 



M I R A B E A U 

given him, nor, in his perpetual narrowness of means, 
to the certainty of being "saved from the claws of any 
dirty little creditor." More than ever he thought that "the 
monarchy was the only anchor of safety that could keep 
the country from shipwreck." But while anarchy was 
making such rapid progress, it was more than ever the 
case that there was "no one at the helm." Failing him- 
self, and since he had, though perhaps only provisionally, 
been discarded, was there no other pilot to whom the 
navigation of the ship of the State could be entrusted in 
such a violent storm ? He thought of the Comtei de 
Provence. 

His relations with Monsieur are still very little known. 
That Prince who "showed no consistency save in his 
perfect egoism " (Sorel), was neither liked nor respected 
by the King before the Revolution. But after July 14 
Louis XVI, fearful of being detained in Paris and of being 
forced to sign a capitulation, had on the advice of 
Mercy, the Austrian ambassador, delivered to Monsieur 
the full powers of Lieutenant-General of the Kingdom. 
Was that evidence of absolute confidence ? The spon- 
taneity and importance of the step are much reduced when 
we remember that the appointment of the Comte d'Artois, 
leader of the counter-revolutionary party, would have been 
taken as an act of defiance and was, therefore, absolutely 
impossible. 

We have seen how after the events of October, being 
entrusted by M. de La Marck with Mirabeau's memoran- 
dum, the carrying out of which would have needed a really 
firm hand. Monsieur showed a complete lack of con- 
fidence in the King's intentions and resolution. That 
step, however, was not without its utility to Mirabeau. 
On more than one occasion the Comte de Provence sent 
his Captain of the Guard, the Due de L6vis, to ask his 
opinion on different subjects. These relations were not un- 
known to La Fayette, who thought he saw in them political 

220 



THE TREATY WITH THE COURT 

intrigues, which filled him with jealous uneasiness, while 
Mirabeau would only admit them to be signs of mere 
friendship and acquaintance. The Tribune further added 
with blunt frankness, through which there peeped the dis- 
appointment provoked by so many abortive endeavours : 
"Circumstances are very great, but men are very small, 
and less than ever do I see of those with whom I would care 
to embark." 

He reproached La Fayette with his indecision, his weak- 
ness, his liking for mediocrities, the amazing attention 
he paid to little slanders. Against such calumny, which 
spared no detail of his private life, neither his love affairs 
nor his debts, Mirabeau rose with a dignity that I would 
we could more often find in him: "Believe me. Marquis, 
if this is their only way of stopping me, I am nowhere 
near the end of my career, for I am bored rather than 
tired, tired rather than discouraged or wounded; and if 
they go on denying me the right to advance, I shall make 
no other reply than by moving forward." He wrote to 
the Comte de La Marck, who had been summoned to 
Belgium on business, during the second fortnight in 
December, giving his freely pessimistic impressions of 
Necker's blunders, the wavering of the Assembly, which 
he called a "great idol," and the aggravation of the 
symptoms of dissolution. 

With Monsieur at the Luxembourg, "they are quiver- 
ing with the most intense anxiety to push forward. 
. . . They are afraid of being afraid.." Suddenly on 
the night of December 24 or 25, a noble conspirator, 
M. de Favras, was arrested and accused of having tried 
to raise 30,000 men to assassinate La Fayette and Bailly, 
and suspected of being the agent of the Comte de Pro- 
vence. Being suspected by public opinion, the Comte de 
Provence went to the Commune and there made a speech 
of protest, which he sent to the President of the Assembly, 
asking him to read it aloud so that " no honest citizen may 

22! 



MIRABEAU 

be left to the discomfort and affliction of whispered doubt." 
This action and the speech were inspired by Mirabeau. 
Their success was great enough for the Tribune to hope 
that Monsieur might win a "powerful ascendency and 
make him his Prime Minister." He drew up a memoran- 
dum, one sentence of which is characteristic: "The royal 
authority should be the rampart of national liberty, and 
national liberty the basis of the royal authority." Un- 
fortunately an insurmountable fatality seemed to insist 
that "the ball should never come to the player's hands." 
Cajoled and tricked by the Queen, watched and disavowed 
by La Fayette, Monsieur weakened and his nolonte (Mira- 
beau's expression) drove him away from the Council, to 
which only a little energy would have taken him. 

He had at least tried to bring Mirabeau nearer to the 
Court and to make use of his services. With this end in 
view he drew up a draft treaty, which he had signed by 
Louis XVI and Mirabeau. The text of this treaty, which 
is only partially given in the Memoirs of La Fayette, is 
exactly reproduced in the History of the Reign of 
Louis XVI by Droz (HI, p. 97): the original is now in 
the possession of the Due de Blacas. The King promised 
Mirabeau an ambassadorship, gave him an allowance of 
50,000 livres a month, for four months at least. In ex- 
change "M. de Mirabeau pledged himself to aid the King 
with his knowledge, his powers and his eloquence, in what- 
ever Monsieur may judge to be useful for the good of the 
State and the interest of the King, two things which all 
good citizens regard as inseparable : and in any case in 
which M. de Mirabeau is not convinced of the solidity of 
the reasons which may be given to him, he shall on such 
subjects refrain from speaking." The exact date of this 
treaty, which may be approximately assigned to January 
1790, is unknown. But it is certain that such a treaty was 
never anywhere near being carried into effect. When 
four months later Mirabeau allied himself with the Court, 

222 



THE TREATY WITH THE COURT 

it was upon a very different basis and under conditions 
which reserved his independence of speech. In this agree- 
ment he ahenated his independence to Monsieur, and put a 
price upon his silence. We may rejoice for the sake of his 
memory that such a treaty came to nothing. What turned 
him from it ? Perhaps the unflattering idea he had of Mon- 
sieur. No doubt he was unwilHng to throw in his lot with 
that "ball of cotton," whom all his advice and conquests 
and operations had not succeeded in making into a man. 

His activity, which hitherto had been widening and 
reaching out into every sphere, now visibly slackened. 
More frank with La Marck than with La Fayette, he wrote 
on December 24: "Ah! how tired and bored I am, and 
how I need you to wind me up again ! " But the crisis 
of exhaustion was not a crisis of discouragement. At the 
end of the year he dictated to his sister, Mme. du Saillant, 
a letter to his wife, who apparently wished to come back 
to him. It was an admirable examination of conscience, 
in which, in the freedom of intimate confidence, he esti- 
mated with no false modesty or excessive pride the part he 
had played during the previous eight months. He set down 
all that he had done and left undone, denied that he was 
a "fellow of low ambition, desiring ribbons and dignities," 
and declaring justly that if the perfidious impotence of the 
Government and the clumsy imbecility of the enemies of the 
Revolution had more than once led him to "pass out of 
his province," he had never yet deserted "his principle," 
and had always desired to remain or to retain to the middle 
way. His programme remained the same : "To revive the 
executive power, to regenerate the royal authority, and 
reconcile it with national liberty." This programme 
appealed to him as a fine and difficult undertaking, for 
which he confessed his desire to become a minister. "The 
decree relating to ministers must be reconsidered. They will 
reconsider it, or the Revolution will never be consolidated." 
However isolated he might be, he did not consider his 

223 



MIRABEAU 

position to be as much clianged as it might seem to be 
from a distance. He was waiting for what he called the 
logic of facts to bring him his opportunity, made up his 
mind he would one day be a minister if circumstances would 
have it so, or settle down to beer and skittles if he had 
money enough, or, if he had not enough, that he would end in 
"the honourable and gentle retreat" of an ambassadorship. 

Thus resigned to his own destiny, he had not lost con- 
fidence in the destiny of the Revolution or the vitality of 
the country. He summed up the position of the monarchy 
in a trenchant and profound sentence contained in a letter 
to Major Mauvillon : "The monarchy is in danger rather 
from lack of government than from conspiracy." To 
float the vessel of the State it was necessary only to call 
in a sound pilot, and with and through him to overcome 
all human suspicions and petty jealousies. . . . "The 
resources of this country, the very mobility of the nation's 
temper, which is its chief vice, make possible so many 
expedients and facilities that there is never any reason in 
France for presumption or despair." 

Less and less in his eyes did Necker appear fitted to be 
the "sound pilot" who could weather the storm. Cer- 
tainly he was no statesman : he had no plan, no will, no 
system, and drifted at the mercy of events, over which he 
had only a hesitating, uncertain and weak control. Quite 
honest, a sincere Liberal, a clever banker, he was not even 
a good financier. Was it an entirely insoluble problem 
to make the "finest of kingdoms" bear the weight of the 
350 to 380 millions of taxes that the situation demanded? 
Mirabeau did not think so. The payment of the interest 
on the debt and the reconstruction of the army were for 
him the two indispensable needs, the satisfaction of which 
would bring security and confidence. He declared in 
favour of a change in the fiscal system. Anticipating the 
work of the Constituent Assembly, he wished the 
Assembly, "in order to put an end to the barbarously con- 

224 



THE TREATY WITH THE COURT 

tradictory collections and contributions," to fix definitely 
the nature and quota of the tax, the assessment of which 
could be left to departments and districts. He demanded 
freedom of industry and trade. Finally, he recognized 
"that nothing could really take root except through a 
good system of public education " ; and, to use his own 
picturesque expression, he set about "planting new men." 

Finance, the army, industry and trade, public education, 
these were the problems to which at the outset of 1790 
Mirabeau's mind was addressed. They did not, however, 
engross him. Would he have been a real statesman if he 
had not also thought of France's position abroad, her 
greatness and influence beyond her frontiers? He was 
thinking of the "banks of the Rhine," as he says in a letter 
to Mauvillon. 

Without method the realization of such a programme 
was impossible. Mirabeau had a method: "We must 
administer," he said. "We should not be compelled to 
make not only general laws, but laws in detail, of which 
we understand and should understand nothing. The 
Government must be the professor, not the pupil; the 
master, not the slave." 

When we summarize his schemes and ideas, when we 
measure their breadth, clarity, and the practical sense of 
his vast intelligence, when we feel a genius so full ready 
to translate its force into action, it is impossible not to 
see in the fatal decree of November 7 one of the most 
deplorable mistakes of the Constituent Assembly. On 
that day party hatred, jealousy, disappointed ambition and 
the most fatal of all parliamentary afflictions, fear, struck 
an irreparable blow at the Revolution and the destiny of 
the country. 

Mirabeau did not regard the Revolution as responsible 
for the injustice which the "recalcitrant, stormy, and ostra- 
cising Assembly" had done him. He remained obstin- 
ately and passionately faithful to it. His friend, M. de 
Q 225 



MIRABEAU 

La Marck, railed against the Revolution, and was amazed 
at its aberrations : no doubt because he had never 
really understood it. Attached to the Court, the con- 
fidant and friend of the Queen, the distinguished noble- 
man was more interested in the monarchy than in the 
Revolution, while Mirabeau regarded the monarchy above 
all as the condition and guarantee of the Revolution. 
This divergence is enough to account for M'. de La Marck 
reproach mg the mighty orator with certain speeches and 
actions as mistakes in conduct though, in spite of appear- 
ances and the violence of the language, they show nothing 
save the constancy of his opinions. 

Was not Mirabeau true to himself at the sitting of 
January 9, 1790, when he took so lofty a tone with the 
Parlement of Rennes, which had refused to register and 
execute the decrees of the National Assembly ? A few 
days later, in the letter he dictated to his sister, he said that 
destruction was still necessary. "The royal authority will 
never really coalesce with the people as long as the Par- 
lements exist. They preserve for it and the nobility the 
fatal and illusive hope of re-establishing the old order of 
things." The Parlements of Rennes, Rouen, Metz, Bor- 
deaux and Toulouse had by their resistance justified this 
prediction. Called to the bar of the Assembly, the Presi- 
dent of the Chambre des Vacations at Rennes, instead of 
justifying himself and bowing to authority, had been so 
bold as to invoke the rights of Brittany. To such 
"criminal lunacy," which, if it were tolerated, would have 
meant the "annihilation of the Revolution and the signal 
for anarchy throughout the Empire," Mirabeau's vengeful 
eloquence responded with a declaration of the national 
sovereignty, the indivisibility of the kingdom, the rights 
of France. "Are you Bretons? The French command 
you. Are you only nobles of Brittany? The Bretons are 
your masters; yes, the Bretons, the men, the Commons, 
what you call the Third Estate." 

226 



THE TREATY WITH THE COURT 

When upon several occasions he intervened in the debates 
occasioned by the disturbances at Marseilles, to which, on 
January 26, he devoted his longest speech, Mirabeau re- 
called how he had been sent by that turbulent city to the 
States-General. But, as a revolutionary and a patriot, he 
felt on the one hand that "the counter-revolution was 
there," and that, on the other, it was a question of 
"enslaving and for ever liberating Provence." These 
debates were the occasion and provocation of extremely 
violent scenes between himself and the Abb^ Maury. The 
Right seemed to be seeking its revenge. Mirabeau was 
its chief adversary and opposed its designs. He did 
not believe in the return to despotism, but, though he had 
not altogether ceased to dread counter-revolution by force, 
he was apprehensive of what he called "negotiation," that 
is to say, the organized incitement of the big towns, and 
their irritation and impatience, skilfully fomented and fed. 
He thought of the inhabitants of the country districts, who 
"understand nothing of our philosophy, for whom our 
love of liberty, whatever it may be, cannot for a long 
time be anything but a hot fit of fever, without whom 
we cannot consolidate the Revolution ; who will take no 
interest in it, but very much the reverse, if they do not find 
in it immediate and considerable relief for themselves." 
His perspicacity was alarmed by the news coming in from 
the provinces : " War over the elections, war against 
smugglers, war against taxes, religious war — there is the 
germ of all these in twenty cantons of the kingdom." 

But he would not, under pretext of reinforcing the 
executive power with provisional powers, furnish it with in- 
struments which might put dangerous obstacles in the way 
of the accomplishment of the Revolution. And he therefore 
vigorously opposed the proposal of Cazal^s to invest the 
King for three months with unlimited executive power. 

On April 19 he frustrated a move on the part of the 
Right, who, on the pretext that certain of its mandates were 

227 



MIRABEAU 

limited, demanded the dissolution of the Assembly. Boldly 
and broadly h€ called to mind the heroic sittings, the 
dangers averted, the services rendered, the work done by 
the Assembly, and he ended this magnificent improvisation 
with the famous phrase which electrified and entranced 
the whole Assembly : " I swear that you have saved the 
commonwealth ! " 

On May 3 a discussion on the municipal organization 
of Paris brought Mirabeau to grips with Robespierre. 
The deputy for Arras, whose reputation was beginning 
to be built up on a few happy speeches, though no one 
could have foretold his extraordinary destiny, demanded 
the preservation of the sixty districts which had been 
created at the beginning of the Revolution to meet the 
circumstances. Mirabeau saw the danger. He did not 
hesitate to describe as "monstrous" in a democracy the 
existence of these primary assemblies which were main- 
tained with "a zeal that was more patriotic than prudent." 
There are two sentences worth quoting from this significant 
utterance. "To ask for the permanence of the districts is 
to try to establish sixty sovereign sections in one great body 
wherein they cannot help producing an effect of action and 
reaction which might well destroy our Constitution." This 
was his judgment and condemnation of the system. "Let 
us not mistake the heated fervour of principles for the 
sublimity of principles." It was also his judgment of the 
man. We know what became of both system and man 
under the Convention. Mirabeau, whose prophetic gaze 
had discerned the disease, was the only man who could 
have been strong enough to deal with it. 

His desire for law and order, his inflexible determination 
to save the Revolution by delivering it from anarchy, did 
not protect him from the suspicions and imputations of 
the moderate party in the Assembly. Fresh disturbances, 
which had led to bloodshed, had broken out at Marseilles. 
The National Guard had taken possession of certain forts. 

228 



THE TREATY WITH THE COURT 

The King had demanded their evacuation and restitution 
by the municipahty to the proper authority. Mirabeau 
approved these measures. But he asked that nothing 
further should be done until information had been gathered 
which might give evidence of plans and plots against 
liberty. With pitiless logic he added: "Why should it 
be culpable in Marseilles on April 30 and not culpable 
here on October 5 ? " The outcry of the Right and vague 
insinuations combined to represent the Tribune as the 
instigator of these disorders. He haughtily spurned the 
slanders "of men who," he said, "would have condemned 
me to the silence of contempt if it were a question only 
of men of their stamp. . . . Their poisoned tongues have 
never for a moment led me to swerve from true prin- 
ciples." Was it an allusion, not understood by his 
auditors, and intended for other ears, to the secret negotia- 
tions which had been in train for several weeks with the 
object of preparing an understanding between Mirabeau 
and the Court? They open a new phase in his troubled 
life, a phase in which his public action became twofold, 
and was complicated by a secret activity. Never was the 
greatness of his genius better affirmed and developed, but, 
alas ! never was it to be relieved from the heavy price of 
that sad servitude which he was doomed by his destiny to 
carry always and everywhere with him. 



229 



CHAPTER XIV 

RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

The Court treats with Mirabeau — Discussion on the Right of War and 
Peace — Interview with the Queen — Mirabeau's foreign policy — The 
tricolour — Understanding with M. Montmorin : Mirabeau's plan. 

On February 4, 1790, Louis XVI unexpectedly visited the 
National Assembly. He came to declare his acquiescence 
in the new decrees relating to general administration. But 
his speech contained more than acquiescence. It was an 
act of faith in constitutional liberty, and a promise to 
support the new order of things against each and every 
attempt that might be made to upset it. The firmly loyal 
tone of this spontaneous declaration produced a great 
impression both in and out of the Assembly. Mirabeau 
was almost alone in standing outside the general en- 
thusiasm, and he denounced "this pantomime" to M. de 
La Marck. The King's speech seemed strange to him. 
As he said, "he could not unhappily help his ears dis- 
cerning " a certain lack of good faith which seemed to him 
ominous for the future. His distrust could only have been 
aroused by the passage in the King's speech in which 
the King rather naively, it must be admitted, appealed to 
the wisdom and "candour " of the Assembly to strengthen 
the executive power. But was not that precisely the 
dominant idea of Mirabeau's policy ? When Louis XVI 
said that without this condition there could be no lasting 
order at home, no consideration abroad, was he not taking 
his text from Mirabeau ? There must have been something 
else at the bottom of Mirabeau's annoyance. The Courrier 
de Provence revealed the real cause of it. He taxed the 

230 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

ministers with having screened their responsibility behind 
the infalHbiHty of the King. In other words, Mirabeau 
understood that the speech was a move on the part of 
Necker and La Fayette. He was not wrong. The 
Swedish ambassador, the son-in-law of the Minister of 
Finance, admits as much in a private letter to his 
sovereign : " Monsieur, who had tried to enter into an 
intrigue with M. de Mirabeau to gain admission to the 
Council and make himself leader of the popular party," 
he wrote, "has been cleverly frustrated. M. Necker and 
M. de La Fayette are therefore to be regarded as the 
two main powers in the Government." 

So, once again, Mirabeau was in a position to gauge 
the influence of La Fayette. Being powerless to move 
against or without him, he tried to approach the General. 
His own personal position was still assailed by those 
"subaltern " difficulties which were overwhelming and 
hampering him. Deprived of resources and the means of 
action, beset with immediate personal anxiety, he was 
alarmed by the trend of public events. Irresistibly 
authority was weakening in face of the menace of anarchy. 
Under pretext of the pubUc danger he disregarded the 
"amiable Conventions which bind men together or thrust 
them apart," and on April i8 he addressed a long letter to 
La Fayette. It is a fine production, adroit, powerful, 
firm and yet deferential. The misfortunes of the State are 
described with force and restraint. How are they to be 
cured ? Mirabeau sees in La Fayette a point round which 
to rally and reunite "opinion through men, since men can 
only be held together through opinion." He offers to 
form a compact and indissoluble political alliance with 
him in which he will associate himself with the popularity 
on which the General's power was based, and to pool with 
it "his talent, his resources and his courage." But that 
Mirabeau may have his fair share of the glory, he must 
be rid of the "cankers " which were poisoning his life and 

231 



MIRABEAU 

made it more difficult for him than for any other man to 
win the popular favour. He asks, therefore, to be released 
from the impediments which the "long-continued errors 
of his private life " had imposed on him to his continual 
mortification. On the other hand, having discovered in 1 
Constantinople a new source of influence which might 
subserve the interests of France, he begs for the renewal 
of the King's old promise of an important embassy. It 
is not often, says Mirabeau, that such confidences are made 
in writing. But he wished to give La Fayette a proof of 
his trust in him, and to give him a document which would 
prove his treachery if he were ever to violate the laws of 
the suggested political union. 

La Fayette only saw in this letter "a clever trick to 
ensnare his delicacy." It is to be regretted, but hardly 
to be wondered at. Washington had well hit off the 
character of his old comrade in arms when he wrote : "All 
your worries come from an unusual sensibility when your 
reputation is in question." Mirabeau's stormy youth, his 
debts, the scandals associated with his name, his impetuous 
familiarity, shocked La Fayette's sensibility and alarmed 
his feeling for his reputation. Raised by extraordinary 
circumstances to a unique position, which was out of pro- 
portion to his merits and his services, La Fayette believed 
himself to be equal to his destiny. He could not see how 
Mirabeau's support could be useful to him. "I neither 
like, nor esteem, nor fear the man," he said. As a matter 
of fact he was less afraid of his antagonism than of his 
collaboration. He felt that in Mirabeau's bold and mighty 
hands his own glory would only be an instrument. Wish- 
ing neither to compromise himself nor to suffer extinction, 
he refused an alliance of which he perceived the dangers 
more clearly than the advantages. In his line of thought 
he was concerned only with himself. If he had considered 
the public interest, must he not have thought otherwise ? 

The Court was in a state of hesitation, ill-informed, ill- 

232 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

protected against the many dangers which threatened it, 
and could not make up its mind to any definite step, or to 
choose for its direction and protection an energetic in- 
fluence in which it could repose confidence and gain and 
give support. Necker, admittedly, had failed. But the 
King was warned and terrified by an experiment which had 
provoked the 14th July, and dared not dismiss him. He 
had asked La Fayette to explain his ideas of the royal 
prerogative. Action having become impossible, the time 
was filled up with consultations. 

For some weeks past the "painful extremity " of turning 
to Mirabeau had been accepted. M. de La Marck was 
away. The Austrian ambassador, de Mercy-Argenteau, 
sent for him. He told him that the King and Queen had 
determined to seek the services of his friend, and counted 
on him to act as intermediary and to sound the Tribune. 
M. de La Mlarck was under no great illusion as to the 
effects to be looked for from such tardy intervention, but 
undertook to carry on the negotiations only on condition 
that the ambassador would take part in them. He 
arranged an interview at his own house between Mirabeau, 
to whom he did not immediately tell the truth, and Comte 
de Mercy. The conversation was frank and cordial, and 
was concerned only with the general situation. Mirabeau 
declared that there could be no improvement until the King 
consented to leave, not France, but Paris. It was the idea 
he had expressed in November in the memorandum read 
by the Comte de Provence. After these preliminary pour- 
parlers, of the real significance of which Mirabeau was 
left in ignorance, M. de La Marck saw the King and 
Queen. Marie Antoinette, who was still filled with horror 
at the recollection of the events of October, wished to be 
reassured as to Mirabeau's attitude. There was no one 
in a better position than La Marck to deny his friend's par- 
ticipation in those events. The King declared that the 
negotiations should go on without reference to his 

233 



MIRABEAU 

ministers and no objection could make him change 
his mind. M. de La Marck was appalled by such danger- 
ous obstinacy, seeing how infallibly it must lead to con- 
flict, and he informed Mirabeau of the royal project. 
Mirabeau embraced it with enthusiasm, as though his own 
and the kingdom's destiny had been changed thereby. 
In accordance with his promise to the King, M. de La 
Marck asked him to state his ideas on the situation in 
writing. 

Mirabeau 's first note dated May lo, 1790, gave Louis 
XVI and Marie Antoinette a satisfaction which they did not 
attempt to conceal and expressed emphatically. The 
Queen questioned M. de La Marck as to the best course 
to take to win Mirabeau's approval of herself and the 
King. M. de La Marck and M. de Mercy were of the 
opinion that the first thing to be done was to pay the 
Tribune's debts. Mirabeau drew up a list of them, the 
sum-total being 208,000 francs, and they went back so 
far as to include the price of his wedding clothes ! He could 
not believe that such an enormous sum would be forth- 
coming, and he asked for a guarantee of 100 louis a month. 
When the King next saw M. de La Marck he gave him 
back the original of the letter, and told him what a good 
impression it had made on him : " Please keep it," he 
added, "together with these four notes on my credit, of 
250,000 livres each. If, as he promises, M. de Mirabeau 
serves me well, you must send him these notes at the end 
of the session of the National Assembly, and he will receive 
a million. In the meanwhile I will see that his debts are 
paid, and I will leave it to you to decide on the amount 
necessary for him to have every month as a provision 
against his immediate difficulties." The Comte de La 
Marck suggested 6000 livres; the King made no objection. 
M. de Fontanges, Archbishop of Toulouse, a protege of 
the Queen, who had absolute confidence in him, was 
charged with the liquidation of Mirabeau's debts. 

234 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

When he heard the news Mirabeau was "wild with joy," 
drunk with it; and so beside himself as to astonish even 
M. de La Marck. Upon reflection M. de La Marck was 
disposed to excuse his transports by attributing them to 
Mirabeau's new-found satisfaction in finding an issue from 
his adventurous existence, and to his pride in thinking that 
he was at last being reckoned with. Being freed of the 
burden of his past, he was in a position if not, in the terms 
of his employment, to give his true measure, at least to 
devote himself usefully to the service of his country. 

Mirabeau's indiscreet and unconscionable delight adds 
to the inevitable sadness which any impartial critic must 
feel on thinking of the terms of such a contract. We 
need not, it is true, condemn in principle his relations 
with the Court. They cast no stain upon the political 
probity or the private morality of the great orator. 
He was a monarchist not only by tradition and principle, 
but because he could not conceive of the maintenance and 
development of the revolutionary conquests, in which he 
had played so large a part, except under the safeguard and 
in the setting of royalty. At the end of May 1789, a month 
after the opening of the States-General, foreseeing the 
gathering storm, he said to Malouet : "We cannot but 
wonder whether monarchy and monarch will survive the 
brewing tempest, or whether mistakes already committed 
and mistakes that cannot fail to be committed will not 
engulf us all." Unswervingly, obstinately, with a clear- 
sightedness and a fidelity which had never for a moment 
wavered, he had set himself, in his speeches and writings, 
in his deeds and in his words, to reconcile the rights of 
King and people, the guarantees of royalty with those of 
liberty. The progress of anarchy, seconded by the weak- 
ness of an irresolute and maladroit Ministry, had made him 
feel with increasing force the necessity of restoring to the 
royal power, which had been left to itself in the midst of 
a tragic crisis, its natural initiative and its legitimate 

235 



MIRABEAU 

prerogative. Irritated as he was by the counsellors who 
had neither plan nor aim, neither programme nor method, 
could he refuse to give the advice asked of him, when, four 
months before the opening of the States-General, he had 
proposed a Constitution to save the kingdom from the plot- 
ting of the aristocracy and the excesses of the democracy ? 
To refuse would have seemed to him an act of desertion, 
and Mirabeau was not the kind of man to desert his cause. 
He would indeed have preferred public action, open fight, 
to carry the assault into the Assembly, to defy danger and 
assume responsibility in the full light of day, to live amid 
the clash of discussion and the reverberations of the national 
tribune. Jealousy and fear had withheld this opportunity 
from his genius. He did not despair of a return of for- 
tune. Meanwhile, perhaps by way of preparing that 
return, he consented to give advice secretly, and resigned 
himself to the anonymous and irresponsible, though none 
the less dangerous, control which the overtures of the 
Court offered him. Already La Fayette, whose tendencies 
were republican, had played a similar part. And later 
on such a part was to prove not at all distasteful either to 
the uncompromising severity of a man like Lameth, con- 
cerned for the safety of the kingdom, or to the generosity 
of Barnave moved by the spectacle of horrible misfortunes. 
The wrong and, not to shrink from using the correct 
word, the disgraceful part of it is to be sought elsewhere. 
When Lucas de Montigny speaks in his Memoirs of "the 
vague and doubtful question of money, which after all is 
quite secondary, or even, in so serious a case, negligible," 
his is the action of a respectful son casting a cloak over 
his father's error. History has other rights, other duties. 
The admiration we may feel for Mirabeau's genius, the 
extraordinary, irresistible quality of his intellectual power 
and kindness of heart, even the pity we cannot but find 
for so much unhappiness, should not stand in the way of 
a judgment which must be severe. 

236 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

It might conceivably be possible to excuse, though not 
to justify, the payment of the debts and the monthly allow- 
ance. M. de Lomenie was not wrong in saying that "there 
was no contravention of honour according to the ideas of 
the ancien regime, and in the case of a gentleman in 
distress, in having his debts paid and his necessities pro- 
vided for by the King." Threatened by his creditors, whose 
importunities were likely to be turned to the service of party 
interest and hatred, Mirabeau was, indeed, only too vulner- 
able. "Why should my enemies not be robbed of every 
pretext against me," he wrote to La Fayette in April, 
"and I be restored, not for my own sake, but for the 
sake of my country now in danger, to the possession of 
my true power ? It is only to that end that I wish my 
debts to be paid." Men of unimpeachable reputation like 
La Marck and Mercy had spontaneously come to this idea, 
the realization of which, when entrusted to his care, had 
in no way shocked the scruples of the worthy Archbishop 
of Toulouse. In order freely to employ Mirabeau and to 
help him to give of his best, it was necessary to release him 
from the cares with which the follies of his youth had 
burdened his maturity. But was it not also necessary, 
since his time, his activity, his pen, and part of his life, 
were being taken, to "assure the independence of his talents 
and character," so that he might give more "development 
and force " to his opinion ? In his justification of Mira- 
beau's having received a monthly allowance from the 
King, M. de La Marck, a royalist nobleman, anticipated 
the judgment of the revolutionary Proudhon : "If we con- 
sider Mirabeau only as a consulting lawyer, whose talent, 
days, nights, secretaries, whose life and courage are 
engaged and occupied, we should grant him the right to 
a legitimate reward." It must be added, to complete the 
facts, that Mirabeau was conducting an important corre- 
spondence with the provinces through numerous agents. 
And I am quite ready to admit that all these considerations 

237 



MIRABEAU 

do up to a certain point make it possible to excuse him 
for having received 6000 livres a month, a remuneration 
for his trouble and expense in giving his services. 

But I confess that I cannot say as much for the promised 
million which historians on both sides have generally 
considered with the rest. Do not the notes signed by the 
King and entrusted to M. de La Marck and made con- 
ditional on effective service, form, whatever we may like 
to say, the unjustifiable and immoral element of the secret 
contract which bound Mirabeau to the Court? Proudhon 
does not recoil from the idea that the Revolution should 
have voted a pension for Mirabeau to assure him rest and 
security in return for his services. I fail to see how such 
a pension could have harmonized with the terrible speech on 
bankruptcy. But at least it is impossible to confuse a 
national reward of that kind, openly voted, with a secret, 
uncertain and prospective reward which depended upon the 
value attached by the King to service given. Mirabeau 
had delivered himself up to the mercies of Louis XVI, 
who while he was "paying him very dearly," used to speak 
of him contemptuously as of a "person undeserving of 
esteem." Such a judgment is painfully humiliating, be- 
cause it is impossible not to feel that it was deserved, and, 
though Ave cannot refuse the great and unhappy Tribune the 
human pity, of which, in spite of everything, he remains 
worthy, conscience and history, like Michelet, answer the 
question : "Was there corruption? " with a sorrowful and 
uncompromising "Yes." 

"When that has been said, let us turn away and fix our 
attention on the reality of things, on the loftiness of the 
man's aim and ideas" (Sainte-Beuve). For, if there was 
corruption, there was no treachery. On that point, 
happily, all the evidence, even the most partial, is unanim- 
ous. M. de La Marck's declaration, heavily underlined : 
"No, Mirabeau never sacrificed his principles to his pecu- 
niary interests; he received money from the King, but it 

238 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

was in order to save the King," might, as coming from 
a friend, be subject to caution. But is it possible to doubt 
the opinion of La Fayette, whose hostile feelings are well 
known, or that of Necker's daughter, Mme. de Stael ? 
La Fayette said : "Mirabeau would not for any sum have 
supported an opinion destructive of liberty or dishonour- 
able to his mind." Mme. de Stael rather differently, but 
no less categorically, said: "Whether Mirabeau did or 
did not accept money from the Court, he was determined 
to be the master and not the instrument of that Court." 

Now let us see him at work. We know the interme- 
diaries between him and the Court : the Comte de La 
Marck received his notes, gave them to M. de Fontanges, 
who transmitted them to the Queen, who had entrusted 
him with "her every thought, her every word, her every 
deed." 

Last of all came the King and the place is only too well in 
keeping with the character of the unhappy Louis XVL 
Thought, decision, action must be undertaken for him. 
But he was so slippery that there was never any certainty 
that he would not escape. The loyalty of his intentions was 
always betrayed by the weakness of his character. The 
judgment passed by one of his brothers and his wife on 
his irresolute nature is that of history. After the events 
of October, the Comte de Provence made this famous 
remark to M. de La Marck: "The King's indecision 
passes all telling. To give you an idea of his character, 
imagine yourself with two oiled ivory balls and trying to 
keep them together." In August 1791 Marie Antoinette 
wrote to M. de Mercy : "You know the kind of man with 
whom I have to deal. Just when you think you have 
convinced him, a word, an argument will make him change 
without his having any idea of it : it is for that reason that 
there are thousands of things which we simply cannot 
attempt." 

Only the Queen had any influence over this weak, un- 

239 



MIRABEAU 

decided ruler. At the beginning of his reign he said : 
"I have read a little history and I know that this State 
has always been ruined by women — legitimate and illicit." 
This was only too true, and there was a tragic prophecy 
in the words. Louis XVI's virtue kept predatory women 
at a distance : his timidity delivered him up to his wife. 
The miserable Calvary which led Marie Antoinette to 
death, her dignity in her prison, the pride which upheld 
her in the face of infamous accusations, her heroism on the 
scaffold cannot avert the judgment of history to which 
as a Queen she belongs. M. de Segur in his impartial 
and attractive book, Au couchant de la monarchie, has 
said with much force: "Truth as well as pity has its 
rights." Truth has served Marie Antoinette's memory by 
justifying her against ignoble suspicions which, alas ! 
came too often from the Court which had encouraged, to 
the swelling of so many filthy libels, her natural coquetry, 
her taste for pleasure, and especially the indiscretions and 
dissipations into which she was drawn by a deplorable set 
of courtiers. But there is no reason why a sort of chival- 
rous magnanimity should deprive posterity of its rights. 
To deny Marie Antoinette's share in politics is to deny 
the evidence. Hating Turgot, Malesherbes, Necker (after 
his recall), before and at the beginning of the Revolution, 
she served the interests, the passions and the spite of a 
coterie whose influence was justified by neither their past, 
their talents, nor their services. The events of October 
5 and 6 had shown with bloody violence the contempt- 
uous hostility and the passionate indignation of which 
she was the object. She had faced the mob with a firm- 
ness which showed her to be a true daughter of Maria 
Theresa. But did she understand the lesson of the terrible 
events that had been unfolded before her eyes? In the 
Hotel de Ville she had with happy tact pronounced the 
word "confidence" which had brought many over to her 
side. Since that time Mirabeau believed that she had 

240 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

abandoned her interest in public affairs. "The Queen," 
he wrote on December 23, "remains in retirement: / do 
not interfere." He undoubtedly never expected her to 
issue from her retirement to appeal to him. 

An attempt had been made to compromise her in the 
Favras affair by fresh proceedings in the matter of the 
necklace. By guiding and saving the Comte de Provence 
Mirabeau had indirectly extricated her from her quan- 
dary. She could not evidently be grateful to him for an 
intervention which implied no sort of service- But perhaps 
she appreciated the access of power given to the orator 
whose irresistible force and whose skill in winding and 
unwinding the most tangled intrigues she had felt to her 
detriment. When she resigned herself to making an 
appeal for his advice, she was still afraid of him. But, 
unstable, inconsequent, incapable of any sustained thought 
as she was, she fell, at any rate at the beginning, into the 
contrary excess. The hopes she had built up on Mira- 
beau 's services hid from her the danger of her situation. 
M. de La Marck was struck by the Queen's careless 
gaiety, her amiable and gracious humour, the ease with 
which she escaped from the terrifying realities of the 
present into recollections of the happy past. In the letter 
of August 16, 1 79 1, of which I have already quoted a 
passage, she spoke of news "so wild and absurd that it 
could only have emanated from a French brain." Was she 
really so absorbed in thought or so firm in project that she 
could pass so severe a judgment on the country of which she 
was Queen ? Had not Prince Xavier de Saxe cast the same 
reproach at her? "She is very light-headed," he said, 
"and absolutely Austrian." She remained light-headed, 
even to the tragic hours which raised her courage so high. 
And she did not cease to be an Austrian. Unhappy was 
this woman, abandoned and a stranger in a strange land, 
whose destiny did but tardily reveal to her her duty in 
prison and at the price of death ! 
R 241 



MIRABEAU 

The letter that Mirabeau, still ignorant of the conditions 
under which he was to lend his support, wrote on May lo, 
1790, to King Louis XVI, is a profession of faith, noble, 
generous and firm, which dominates, explains and prepares 
his action. Being vowed, he says, to the silence of con- 
tempt, he only abandons his project of retireiment to 
attempt to save the kingdom from anarchy and to con- 
tribute to "something other than a vast demolition." In 
his first words he declares that "the re-establishment of 
the legitimate authority of the King is the first need of 
France, and the only means of saving the country." He 
wishes to put the executive power in its right place, in 
the Constitution and in the hands of the King, in order to 
bring the whole public force of the country to bear on 
securing respect for the law. But, if he deplores the ex- 
cesses into which the Revolution had drifted, he twice 
affirms his horror of a counter-revolution, which he avers to 
be at once "dangerous and criminal." Guided by these 
principles, he agrees to give his written opinion on events in 
order to direct, to forestall, or to repair them. Without 
guaranteeing success, which can never depend upon one 
man, he promises everything in his power — his loyalty, his 
zeal, his activity, his energy, and "a courage which perhaps 
is not thoroughly estimated." Knowing the extent of his 
pledge and his desire, he asks that his writings may be 
placed in safe keeping, for, he says with a pride in which 
tliCre is already something of his promised courage, "they 
will remain for ever my condemnation or my justification." 

Circumstances at once played into his hands. M. de 
Montmorin had on Mlay 14 approached the National 
Assembly with a demand for subsidies with which to arm 
fourteen ships of the line against the preparations being 
made by England. Alexandre de Lameth made use of 
the incident to raise the question to whom belonged the 
right of war and peace — the nation or the King ? Before 
allowing the opening of a full-dress theoretical debate 

242 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

which was to occupy many sittings, Mirabeau's political 
mind began to work at high pressure. Having gained the 
admission that the right of armaments and the right to 
take immediate steps would always belong to the supreme 
executive of the national will, he procured a vote of thanks 
to the King for having taken the necessary precautions for 
the maintenance of peace. 

The discussion brought into conflict two absolute and 
extreme tendencies. Those on the Right wished to give 
the King the sole right of war and peace; those on the 
extreme Left claimed to reserve the exercise of that right 
to the Assembly. In his first speech on May 20 Mirabeau 
took up a position between the two contentions in favour 
of a system which would give each of the two powers a 
share, and would allow for action and purpose, execution 
and deliberation. He stated as a principle that the right 
to make war or peace belonged to the nation. Then he 
delegated the exercise of that right concurrently to the 
legislative and to the executive power. His scheme gave 
the King the duty of watching over the external safety 
of the kingdom, of maintaining good relations and con- 
ducting negotiations abroad, of making preparations for 
war, of distributing the land and sea forces, and, in case 
of actual hostilities, of directing them. In the case of 
imminent hostilities or an actual outbreak, or of having 
to support an ally, or of being forced to confirm a right by 
force of arms, the King was to advise or to convoke the 
legislative body and ask it for the necessary supplies. 
Thus informed the Assembly could approve or dis- 
approve of the war, and in case of disapproval could 
censure the King's Ministers and refuse the money. At 
any point the legislative body could require the executive 
power to negotiate for peace. The scheme reserved to the 
executive the right to call out the National Guard if the 
King were to wage war in person. Precautions were taken 
to ensure the disbandment of the troops after the conclusion 

243 



MIRABEAU 

of peace. Finally, the King was accorded the right to 
sign treaties of peace, alliance, or commerce with foreign 
Powers so long as they did not take effect without the 
ratification of the legislative body. 

The eleven articles of Mirabeau's scheme, drawn up, with 
his approval, by Le Chapel ier, after a series of brilliant and 
stormy debates, gained the almost unanimous assent of the 
Assembly. They laid down the essential principles which 
have passed into every subsequent constitution. Mirabeau 
brought to the service of his thesis an altogether excep- 
tional force of argument. His desire to placate public 
opinion, which was ill-instructed and excited by intrigue, 
constrained the use of certain awkward or obscure expres- 
sions. But the whole thing is admirably clear and logical. 
Truth shines through it with irresistible compelling power, 
and fortifies the essential and permanent principles of 
government against the sophistry of party. 

No doubt Mirabeau proclaims that "the French nation 
renounces all idea of conquest, and will never use its power 
against the liberty of any people." But he had too much 
practical good sense to believe in the establishment of per- 
petual peace through the percolation of such disinterested- 
ness, and to leave France unarmed against Europe in 
arms: "Shall we ever be so fortunate as suddenly to see 
the miracle to which we owe our liberty repeated bril- 
liantly in the two hemispheres ? " Against the exclusive 
right to make war delegated to an assembly of a thousand 
men he has urgent objections expressed in the happiest 
form : "While one member may be proposing deliberation, 
the war may be demanded by the public with no uncertain 
voice. You will see yourselves surrounded with an army 
of citizens. You wish to avoid being deceived by Minis- 
ters : will you never deceive yourselves ? " History, which 
he had studied, gives ample support to his contention. 
Have not the free nations always been distinguished by 
the most barbarous and ambitious wars ? Has it not 

244 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

always been under the "spell of passion" that political 
assemblies have declared war ? " We must not import 
republican forms into a government which is both repre- 
sentative and monarchical." 

With such words Mirabeau transcended the debate, 
generalized the discussion, raised the particular question to 
the level of a constitutional problem. He warned the 
Assembly against the danger of "projecting the alarms of 
the moment into the future," of exaggerating fear to the 
point of making the cure worse than the evil, of dividing 
the citizens of the country into two parties always ready 
to conspire against each other, instead of uniting them in 
the cause of liberty. He attached their inalienable value 
to the legitimate rights of the executive power and of the 
monarch : "See to it," he says, "that the King has nothing 
to regret but what the law cannot allow, and do not fear, 
lest a rebel King, himself abdicating his throne, should 
run the risk of being hurried from victory to the scaffold." 
The Right murmured, and d'Espremesnil protested in the 
name of the inviolability of the royal person. Unper- 
turbed, Mirabeau dismissed the accusation of bad faith. 
"You have all understood," he said, "my supposition of a 
deposed king in revolt coming with an army of Frenchmen 
to conquer a position of tyranny : such a king, in such a 
case, is no longer a king." 

This ardent, luminous, passionate and wise speech, in 
which the feeling for reality skilfully frustrates sophistry 
and victoriously destroys chimerical visions, was answered 
by Barnave. Uplifted by the greatness of the debate, 
by emulation, by the passions of the people, swept out 
of himself, he made a profound impression. His system, 
which sees in the King the supreme depositary of the 
executive power, reserves the right to declare war and 
peace exclusively to the legislative body. The Assembly, 
moved less by the arguments than by its fear of giving 
a King in whom it had no trust the means of crushing by 

245 



MIRABEAU 

means of war the liberties which had been conquered with 
so much difficulty, wished to put it to the vote. Mirabeau 
scented danger: "Either," he said, "M. Barnave's friends 
believe that his speech will triumph over every reply to it, 
or they do not believe it. If they believe it, it seems to 
me reasonable to expect them in the generosity of their 
admiration not to dread a reply, and that they will give 
us leave to make a reply ; if they do not believe it, it is 
their duty to seek further information." The Opposition 
yielded grudgingly. Mirabeau was given the right to 
reply. 

Only a short while before he had declared himself to 
be "crushed by the weight of work beyond his power." 
That was the orator's coquetry. Now in the tribune he 
was more supple, more powerful, more eloquent than ever. 
His self-possession was disturbed neither by the popular 
excitement which had brought a crowd of fifty thousand 
men to the hall, nor by the plots and intrigues of his 
enemies, nor by Freron's threats, nor by the violence and 
frenzy of the pamphlets distributed at the door, nor by the 
fierce antagonism of the hostile tribunes, nor by the fevered 
turmoil of an assembly still warm from the triumph it had 
given Barnave. With his very first words, with absolute 
self-mastery, with weighty deliberateness, calm and digni- 
fied, as though he were not staking his whole genius, 
perhaps his very existence, he set aside all passion, hatred, 
the irascibility of wounded vanity: "It would seem," he 
declared, "that it is impossible, without committing a 
crime, to have two opinions on one of the most delicate 
and difficult questions of social organization ! " Then, 
suddenly, with a swift allusion to the popular suspicions, 
to Barnave's success, to the vengeance with which he had 
himself been threatened, he changed his tone, and com- 
pelled the attention of the Assembly, which his self- 
possession, absolutely dominating the tumult, had reduced 
to silence : " I also, a few days ago, came near to being 

246 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

borne in triumph ! And now they cry in the streets : The 
High Treason of the Comte de Mirabeau." It is impossible 
to summarize what follows. If there is in the whole of 
French oratory a passage which, for loftiness of tone, 
nobility of inspiration, restrained force of indignation and 
scorn, for largeness of movement and marvellous choice 
of words, is to be set against the oratory of the ancients, 
none other could be chosen, for none could be found in 
which there is such a perfect blend of lasting humanity 
and actual tingling life. 

This magnificent exordium overshadows the whole of 
the rest of the speech, the precision and dialectic of which 
deserve almost equal admiration. Mirabeau had been 
reproached with having taken refuge in subtleties. He 
endeavours to reply with a directness great enough to 
enable him to say to Barnave : " If it rests with me, this 
day will lay bare the secret of our respective loyalties." 
The structure of his eloquent opponent's argument rested 
on a sophism, which confused the legislative body with 
the legislative power. The legislative body resided in the 
Assembly, but the legislative power belonged both to the 
Assembly, which deliberated and voted, and to the King, 
who ratified and acted. To attribute the right of war and 
peace solely to the legislative body, was, in the most 
terrible crisis, to suppress an organ which, in ordinary 
legislation, in the name of the Constitution, exercised 
rights which were formally acknowledged. Must we, 
because monarchy has its dangers, renounce its advantages, 
and because fire burns, deprive ourselves of the warmth 
and light that we get from it? "Everything can stand 
except inconsequence : let us say that we do not need a 
King : let us not say that we only need an impotent and 
useless King." In order to show that governments some- 
times try to evade their responsibilities by making war, 
Barnave had cited the example of Pericles, who, when he 
was unable to meet his liabilities, began the Peloponnesiah 

247 



MIRABEAU 

war. Was he a king or a despotic minister ? " Pericles 
was a man who, having the art to flatter popular passion, 
and to secure applause as he left the tribune, by his own or 
his friends' munificence, forced into the Peloponnesian 
war^ — whom ? The National Assembly of Athens." The 
National Assembly of France felt the sting of this shaft. 

One by one Mirabeau then took the articles of his 
scheme, dissected them, justified them, and ended with a 
nobly generous peroration in which, calling to mind his ser- 
vices, he set them against the virulent libels then current, 
"the yelping of envious mediocrity." It was a triumph! 

Scornful though he was of insult and calumny, he could 
not remain insensible to the atrocious campaign in which 
his adversaries (Barnave must be excepted) tried to 
diminish the effect of his success. Victorious in the 
Assembly, he tried to bring the question before the country. 
It is to be regretted that in order to cover up certain 
small concessions which the discussion had induced him 
to make, he made modifications in his first speech which 
party hatred endeavoured to turn to profit. But the letter 
which he addressed to the departments remains an unfor- 
gettable testimony of the determined frankness with which 
he affirmed the necessity of "passing from a state of legiti- 
mate insurrection to the lasting peace of a real social 
state." It was the language of a statesman. In one of 
his speeches he had not been afraid to say that "wisdom 
dwells not in extremes," and that the desire to destroy 
should not impede the desire to reconstruct. It is clear 
that he did not reserve the expression of his ideas for the 
King alone in the form of secret advice. He addressed 
sovereign and people in the same energetic language to 
their common edification and profit. 

On this question of the right of war and peace La Fayette 
had voted with Mirabeau. With some political sagacity 
the King tried to bring them together. This desire led 
Mirabeau on June i to approach the General once more. 

248 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

But the tone of his letter gave indications of the change 
that had come over the situation. Side by side with incon- 
trovertible truths were passages which in their irreverent 
irony could not but exasperate and irritate La Fayette's 
susceptibilities. When Mirabeau said to him: "Your 
great qualities need my impulse; my impulse needs your 
great qualities," he was speaking and seeing with indis- 
putable exactitude. He was no less right in declaring 
that decision was the first need and the only means of 
salvation. But he lacked tact or prudence, just though the 
reproach might be, in reminding the General of "the small 
men who, for small considerations and by petty man- 
oeuvres, short-sightedly " were trying to alienate them. 
La Fayette thought the proposal calculated in tone "to 
join them on a footing very different from that of their 
previous acquaintance." He withdrew. Mirabeau was 
offering to be his Pere Joseph, but, after all, would he go on 
for long being satisfied with a merely shadowy eminence, 
and was he not led by his ambition, which was thoroughly 
justified by his genius, to hope to play the part of Richelieu 
to a new Louis XHI ? Besides, he had so little faith in the 
result of his advances, that, on the very day when he made 
them, he devoted almost the whole of his first note to the 
Court to a demonstration of the necessity of weakening 
La Fayette's authority. He has been accused of duplicity. 
That is going too far. There is a lack of kindliness in his 
portrait of La Fayette, which is rather overdrawn. But 
there is a good deal of truth in what he says about that 
"irresponsible Minister" who was obeyed by responsible 
Ministers. The position that circumstances had given La 
Fayette was false, uncertain and dangerous. Though he 
was incapable of facing the dangers and assuming the 
duties of government, he could not easily bring himself 
to allow others to play the part for which he was unfitted. 
From this point of view Mirabeau was not wrong in taxing 
him with his pliability and weakness : " In the frightful 

249 



MIRABEAU 

storm which is about to break over us, let him choose skil- 
ful pilots, capable of saving us from shipwreck, and I will 
say nothing, or rather I will applaud him." The occasion 
for such applause never came. 

Almost all Mirabeau's notes to the Court at this early 
period return insistently to the same point. He is always 
denouncing, especially on the eve of the Federation, La 
Fayette's "ambitious incapacity," his intention of having 
himself appointed General, and his designs on the dictator- 
ship. His attacks gain in poignancy from the fact that his 
genuine anxiety for the public safety was mingled with 
the bitterness of personal spite. Mirabeau foresaw the 
brilliancy of the celebrations with which the Federation 
festivities would be attended, and he desired to figure in 
them as President of the Assembly. The choice lay with 
La Fayette, who, desiring a "virtuous patriot," rejected 
Mirabeau. Such cruel words are not easily forgiven. 

In his very first note Mirabeau spoke of the decree which 
forbade deputies to be Ministers, and of the necessity for 
rescinding it. Meanwhile he would have liked to have 
a faithful man on the Council who should "watch the 
current of events and give methodical advice." The King 
did not understand. 

At the outset of his relations with the Court, Mirabeau 
had defined his attitude in one sentence : " I shall be what 
I have always been : the defender of the monarchical power 
regulated by the laws, and the apostle of liberty guaranteed 
by the monarchical power." The note of July 3, his 
eighth, strongly accentuated his position, re-established a 
comparison between the royal authority as it was under the 
ancien regime and what it had become since the summon- 
ing of the States-General. Under the old order the King 
had no absolute power, since he had to accommodate the 
nobility, the clergy, the parlements and the Court. His 
authority was "incomplete, because it had no legal 
foundation; insufficient, because it relied more on public 

250 



I 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

power than on public opinion ; uncertain, because a revolu- 
tion, such as might break out at any moment, could over- 
throw it." The Constitution gives the King powers which 
are certainly insufficient, but are at any rate preferable to 
such precariousness. It liberates him from the subjection 
which for centuries had weighed on the monarchy : " Is 
it nothing to be without parlements, without States, with- 
out clergy, privilege, nobility ? " The essential is to ad- 
minister. "To administer is to govern; to govern is to 
reign ; that is the whole thing in little." The Assembly 
had usurped that power : it must be taken from it. Thus 
the King was interested in the Constitution which pro- 
cured him real advantages. He ought, therefore, to sup- 
port it, develop the good in it, and correct its weaknesses. 
In order to amend administrative bodies, which had grown 
too complicated, to reconstitute the army, to establish 
taxes on a new basis, it was necessary to act on public 
opinion, which was the sovereign of all legislators. 
Mirabeau makes his appeal for an agreement between public 
opinion and that of the King, so that "the national party, 
constituted of the factious and the malcontent, would 
become the party of the King." When there were thirty- 
six millions to be employed solely in maintaining the 
splendour of the throne, when the support of the influence 
and power of a great National Assembly were to be looked 
to, there could be, according to him, no other excuse for 
failure but that of being ill advised and ill served. 

Mirabeau, for his part, was determined to give useful 
advice and loyal service. But of what value were the 
notes without the animation of his voice, his intonation, 
his gestures ? What could be the use of written com- 
munications between men who did not know each other 
and had never seen each other? The "unhoped-for 
favours" which the King showered on Mirabeau through 
the intermediation of the Comte de La Marck had raised 
his courage. His dignity, his need of confidence, and 

251 



MIRABEAU 

perhaps his curiosity desired more. He let it be under- 
stood that a secret interview with the King or the Queen 
would be useful to his plans and their interests. M. de 
La Marck communicated that idea to M. de Mercy, who 
in his turn told the Queen. The interview took place on 
July 3, 1790, at Saint Cloud. 

Since the beginning of his negotiations with the Court, 
Mirabeau had sought rather to come to an understanding 
with the Queen than with the King. The first lines of 
his first note were singularly characteristic: "I professed 
monarchical principles even when I could see only the 
weakness of the Court, and, knowing nothing of the soul 
or the mind of the daughter of Maria Theresa, could not 
count on that august auxiliary." That august auxiliary 
had been invoked by him to act with regard to La Fayette, 
and invoked in strange terms ! "The King has only one 
man, his wife. There is no security for her but in the re- 
establishment of the royal authority. I like to think that 
she would not wish to live without the crown ; but I am 
very sure that she will not preserve her life if she does not 
preserve her crown. The moment will come, and soon, 
when it will be necessary to see what a woman and a child 
can do in an exodus on horseback ; it is a method not 
unknown in her family ! " 

Meanwhile, as it was impossible to "find a way out of 
an extraordinary crisis with the aid of ordinary rules and 
ordinary means," Mirabeau, once a prisoner in the Chateau 
d'lf, the fort of Jbux, and the Keep of Vincennes, com- 
mitted for debt, sentenced for rape and seduction, Mira- 
beau, the elect of the Tiers, the orator of the Revolution, 
went, on aflfairs of State, to see King Louis XVI and 
Queen Marie Antoinette ! 

As he drove along on the morning of July 3 to Saint 
Cloud, did he remember the words he had used on June 17, 
1783, before the Parlement of Aix in his action against 
his wife? On that day, attracted by the sensational case 

252 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

and by his name, already famous, the Archduke Ferdinand 
of Austria, governor of the Milanais, and the Archduchess 
were present. The Archduke was Marie Antoinette's 
brother. Mirabeau did not let slip the opportunity for 
words of homage : " Which of us," he said, " if he wished 
to find the hallowed image of justice and to embellish it 
with all the charm of beauty, would not set up the august 
image of our Queen ? " 

Almost at the same moment his father, the old Marquis, 
was, in contrast, writing these curious sentences : " Louis 
XIV would be greatly astonished if he were to see the 
wife of his successor in peasant's garb and apron, un- 
attended by pages or any one, running about the palace 
and the terraces, asking the nearest lackey to give her 
his hand, and going hand in hand with him down the 
stairs. Other times, other cares ! " Other times, other 
cares ! Rudely dragged back to Paris, guarded, a prisoner, 
the shepherdess of Trianon was thinking how she could 
save her family and the kingdom, her crown, her children, 
her life. Would the man she was expecting, the man she 
had despised, the man who had treated her with scant 
respect, be able to point out the way to deliverance and lead 
her to salvation ? The scenes of October 6 when her 
guards were cut down, her palace was invaded, her person 
threatened, the mob let loose and howling, rose before her 
eyes. She could neither rid herself of the memory nor, 
in spite of everything she had been told, dissociate it from 
the name of Mirabeau. When she saw him she was filled 
with horror and terror. She mastered herself, however, and 
as she talked to him and he, in his caressing voice, told 
her of his loyalty and respect, his mistakes and his remorse, 
his intentions and his hopes, she began to discern a gener- 
ous and warm-hearted man beneath the monster whose 
proximity she had dreaded. How could she doubt the 
sincerity and loyalty of one who could speak so? How 
could she but rely upon a devotion which offered a life 

253 



MIRABEAU 

as hostage? Surprised to find such charm and deHcacy 
allied with such tremendous power, she became wholly 
woman, with all the graces of her irresistible amiability, 
without forgetting what she owed to her dignity as a 
Queen. The King on his part was simple, resigned to 
the necessary sacrifices, conciliatory and trustful. Mira- 
beau was overcome with emotion, and, according to Mme. 
Campan, cried as he kissed the Queen's hand : "Madame, 
the monarchy is saved ! " It is impossible to vouch for it, 
but there can be no doubt that the somewhat romantic 
mystery of the interview increased Mirabeau's conviction 
that the royal authority must be restored as quickly as 
possible if the country were to be retrieved from the abyss 
towards which it was being hurried. 

Unhappily the King was growing more and more in- 
capable of making up his mind or sticking to it. Mira- 
beau had fixed on the Federation festivities, when 
delegates from all parts of the kingdom would be 
assembled, as the most favourable opportunity for associat- 
ing Louis XVI with the Revolution, and giving the King 
his rightful place, the first. His advice, which was 
prudent and easy to follow, was not listened to. He felt 
it bitterly. After having threatened to use his power for 
his own ends if he could not find any employment in the 
public welfare, he resumed his consultations. His notes 
were sent in one after another, pointing out the means of 
preparing for a royal journey to Fontainebleau, or suggest- 
ing the reorganization, with wise precautions, of the body- 
guards, or desiring to separate the Swiss from the rest of 
the army so as to preserve them from a contagion which 
Mirabeau held to be dangerous to their fidelity. 

He had a further opportunity in the tribune of the 
Assembly of explaining his view of the duties incumbent 
on the army, the unsettled state of which had been revealed 
by several incidents. A mutiny had broken out in a 
regiment at Metz. A few days later a naval ofificer had 

254 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

been assassinated at Toulon. The Assembly was inclined 
to be content with isolated measures. Mirabeau thought 
it preferable to apply a more systematic remedy to a disease 
that was unhappily widespread and contagious: "You 
cannot," he said forcibly, "treat an ulcerated body by 
dressing one sore after another." He suggested a trans- 
fusion of new blood by means of a general dismissal of 
the troops, followed immediately by an enrolment upon 
oath of all the officers and soldiers who wished to rejoin 
the service. The remedy was, perhaps, too bold to be 
efficacious, but it is worth while to preserve Mirabeau's 
declarations made during the discussions. "The army 
does not realize that it cannot exist without severe disci- 
pline, that the public peace cannot subsist with an in- 
subordinate army. You cannot dissemble the fact that if 
the Declaration of the Rights of Man contained principles 
of no common import, the army could only be sufficiently 
organized to maintain the public liberty through a declara- 
tion of the duties of each citizen. Order will not be re- 
established until the soldiers have learned that they may not 
separate their rights from their duty." 

These disturbances hardly left him room for hope that 
a civil war could be avoided. He even asked himself if 
it m.ight not be a necessary evil. But, he wrote to Mau- 
villon, "the throne has no ideas, no movement, no will," 
and he added that the road had never been more beset with 
traps and ambuscades. 

He proceeded along this treacherous ground bravely 
facing the difficulties which rose up on all sides. The situa- 
tion was growing graver both at home and abroad. The 
humanitarian illusions which then obsessed so many minds 
had not affected his sturdy common sense. At the time of 
his first speech on the right of war and peace, though he 
had foreshadowed in the remote future universal Free Trade, 
uniiing Europe into one great family, he had admitted 
that by changing her political system France had not 

255 



MIRABEAU 

forced the other nations to change theirs. He saw that 
the enthusiasm for liberty could not win over the world 
as swiftly as certain abstract minds of the Jacobin Society 
were hoping. He had acknowledged the necessities of 
his time by inviting the Assembly to renounce war for 
conquest, but he was not deceived by the "candour" of 
the Abb6 de Saint-Pierre. Universal peace was in his 
eyes a philosophic dream, to which he refused to sacrifice 
the interests of a country surrounded by jealous neigh- 
bours, and threatened with hostilities: "Though it is 
commendable to desire such concord, yet, as we seek it not 
in the meanest of our villages or the smallest of our 
hamlets, it would be absurd to expect it from the entire 
world." Also he thought that "inasmuch as the reason 
of a dishonest man will prevail if he be the stronger, . . . 
France could not isolate herself without very soon finding 
the measure of her true greatness in her apparent 
greatness." ; 

It was from this point of view that, from the outset, he 
regarded the conflict which the possession of the bay of 
Nootka in California was about to let loose between 
England and Spain. We know how insistently, in writ- 
ings prior to the meeting of the States-General, he had 
expressed himself in favour of the English alliance. The 
facts and his own reflections had definitely turned him 
away from it. With a soberness of thought and expression 
that are quite remarkable, he observed : "England is rather 
a commercial than a territorial power. She sees an enemy 
in any nation which in any fashion whatsoever is likely 
to restrict her commerce." Moreover, in an unpublished 
memorandum, he pronounced himself in favour of main- 
taining the alliance with Spain, even if it were to lead to a 
war with England. That had for fifty years been the 
fundamental basis of our traditional policy which had found 
expression in 1761 in the Family Compact. But these 
words, which indicated not so much the union of the two 

256 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

countries as an understanding between the Bourbons, did 
not ring true in 1790. When, in the spring, there were 
signs that the dispute between England and Spain was 
growing acute, Mirabeau understood the danger. Spain 
called on us to fulfil our pledges, and made it clear that 
if we refused she would be forced to "seek other friends 
and allies." The gravity of the threat was accentuated by 
the hesitation of M. de Montmorin, who, though he could 
not repudiate our formal obligations, yet shrank from sub- 
mitting them to an Assembly whose hostility he dreaded. 
At the very outset Mirabeau indicated the line to be taken. 
It was clear to him that, the treaty not being national, its 
ratification would be impossible, whatever he might do. 
Therefore he proposed to send a negotiator to Spain at 
once to procure and draw up a revised treaty. With the 
draft, which would take into account the changes that had 
taken place in France and of our legitimate susceptibilities, 
the Assembly could easily be made to choose between a 
previous alliance, based on commercial advantages, and an 
isolation that was to be dreaded (June 23). 

He returned again and again with increasing urgency 
to this advice, and he even indicated the men to be chosen 
for such a delicate mission. Unfortunately, by excluding 
his Ministers from the confabulations he held with Mira- 
beau, the King had made the position of his secret adviser 
very difiicult. Mirabeau was constantly impeded by 
hesitations and contradictions which, through the secrecy 
of his position, he could not overcome. This "palpitation 
of attempt and resignation, of half-will and dejection," 
this "weakness joined to so much audacity," worried and 
irritated him. Fearful of the possibility of a war in which 
everything might fall to the ground, a war which he 
thought as dangerous to the Revolution as to the kingdom, 
he went so far as to write : " How dare we propose to the 
King that he should attempt for Spain what he dare not 
undertake for himself ? How can his very existence be 
s 257 



MIRABEAU 

compromised in an undertaking which is not his own ? " 
If only there had been a plan, some determination, some 
directing idea ! He was so alarmed by the confusion at 
home and abroad that he dared not lay before the King a 
picture of the "hideous" consequences he foresaw. Ill 
supported, hardly heeded or understood, he felt that he 
could only point out a few "details of the pending disaster," 
and he added in a sorrowful, prophetic tone: "I should 
be grieved indeed if so good a Prince and a Queen so 
highly gifted were of no use at all, even through the 
sacrifice of their consideration and security, in the restora- 
tion of their country : indeed, were this so, and myself to 
be among the first to fall beneath the blade of destiny, I 
should be a memorable example of what happens to 
men who, in politics, are too far ahead of their contem- 
poraries." 

In the course of this note, which is both powerful and 
melancholy, he declared that, in the Committee of Foreign 
Affairs, he would maintain that "we cannot meddle in any 
affairs other than our own, and that we must seek only 
to be at peace with whosoever is at peace with us " 
(August 17). 

The Assembly returned to one of Mirabeau's ideas, 
having deferred its examination until after the discussion 
on the right of war and peace, and on August i appointed 
a diplomatic committee. It was composed of Mirabeau 
himself, Barnave, Freteau, Menou, d'Andre and Duchate- 
let, and was the more completely dominated by the Tribune, 
as he was the only member who, by his writings, his 
life and his experience, had been prepared for questions 
dealing with foreign policy. Being commissioned to 
report on the demands of Spain, Mirabeau read the com- 
mittee's memorandum at the sitting of August 25. A 
witty woman, who, inaccurately, attributed the basis of 
it to Comte Louis de S^gur, reproached Mirabeau with 
having "shirked." Stung to the quick, Mirabeau replied, 

258 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

in a letter to the Comte de La Marck, with a few lines 
which make no concealment of the fact: "It needs," he 
said, "more trouble and real cleverness (not genius) to 
' shirk ' in such a way than to fight : it is perhaps the 
rarest part of talent, at least in any distinguished talent, 
because it is the least attractive, and also because it lives 
on an accumulation of small combinations, privations and 
services. You caii tell the fair Marquise that in politics 
the public man who has not abandoned all hope of influ- 
ence, and who considers himself more as a statesman 
than as an orator or a writer, could have no other course 
open to him." 

Mirabeau rightly judged himself. In him the states- 
man dominated the orator by the combined boldness and 
wisdom of his political judgment, by his readiness to bend 
to difficulties and circumstances, by his wide and ripe 
knowledge of men, by an almost unique gift of gauging 
the real importance of events and foreseeing their con- 
sequences. His report on the affairs of Spain was a 
delicate task which demanded infinite tact and subtlety. 
He had to satisfy Spain while soothing her, to warn Eng- 
land without threatening her, to respect an alliance con- 
cluded by the old order apparently in a family interest and 
to adjust it to accord with the ideas of the Revolution. 
Mirabeau was not unworthy of the task. Very cleverly he 
submitted to the Assembly two principles which should 
result in "fulfilling their engagements without rashness, 
changing the old system without violence, and avoiding a 
war without weakness." On the one hand the Assembly 
declared that treaties previously concluded should be 
respected by the French nation, and that, on the other, the 
King should inform the Powers that Only purely defensive 
and commercial stipulations would be recognized. It was 
not easy to reconcile these two propositions. How were 
they to be appUed to Spain ? How were they to substitute 
for a compact between two Cabinets, made by ambition and 

259 



MIRABEAU 

always threatened by realities, a really national compact 
which would dispose of useless and offensive stipulations, 
and "in some sort bring the two countries together and 
form a bond of great interests and mighty efforts ? " 

Anxiety for the new Constitution, round which it was 
indispensable to group the whole public force of the State 
in order to destroy the obstacles which beset it, had 
dominated the deliberations of the diplomatic committee. 
But to condemn war in the name of principles was not 
enough to guarantee against it a nation which had abdicated 
neither its interests nor its rights. "Why," said Mirabeau, 
"should the very necessity of assuring peace force the 
nations to ruin themselves in defensive preparations ? " 
He vowed that such a "frightful policy" should soon be 
held in horror all the world over, and he held out the pro- 
spect of a time when liberty "should absolve the human race 
of the crime of war and proclaim universal peace." But, 
having so far contributed to the more or less remote 
success of a humanitarian philosophy, he added that it 
could not determine the conduct of France, and he ended 
with an appeal for the strengthening of the fleet. How 
many parliamentary debates, since then, have followed the 
same lines ! 

The applause was unanimous. The Spanish Govern- 
ment ordered a translation of Mirabeau's speech to be 
published. But Pitt's diplomacy procured a more effective 
success. Less than two months later, on October 12, 1790, 
Spain signed at the Escurial a treaty in which she ceded 
the bay of Nootka to England and entered into relations 
with her. Mirabeau was not responsible for this check. 
The very day after his speech he began to fear the con- 
sequences of the skill and activity of the British Govern- 
ment. "Our weakness," he said, "has aided them, and 
our resolution came so late that we cannot await the 
reply of Spain without some anxiety." If his advice had 
been heeded earlier and a cordial understanding with 

260 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

Spain had been established, England's plans would have 
been upset and Pitt's project frustrated. 

The unrest prevailing in Europe and shaking the Con- 
tinent to its foundations, had many causes prior to the 
French Revolution and independent of its influence. But 
it was inevitable that the Revolution, disturbing the peace 
of kings and exciting the peoples, should add new elements 
to the conflicts that were already begun or were imminent. 
In a prophetic memorandum Mirabeau wrote an often 
quoted sentence : " Burke has said that France presented 
nothing but a vast emptiness in politics. Burke has made 
a very foolish remark, for that emptiness is a volcano, 
whose subterranean disturbances and proximate eruptions 
it were rash to ignore." Who could foresee the "incal- 
culable shocks " which that eruption would bring forth ? 
Feeling the necessity of reorganizing the turbulent, dis- 
ordered and mutinous army, Mirabeau wished to avoid 
the possibility of war. Peace abroad was no less neces- 
sary to the "honour and safety" of the authors of the 
Revolution than to the threatened monarchy, so long as 
the Constitution remained incomplete owing to the hatred 
and mutual suspicion of the various parties. How was 
peace to be assured ? " When a man is wounded," said 
Mirabeau, "and cannot wield his sword, he must use his 
shield more carefully, more skilfully, and more swiftly than 
ever." Never had the shield been more necessary. Diffi- 
culties and dangers were crowding in from every side. 
If the National Assem.bly, harassed and absorbed by 
internal events, had, during the first year of its existence, 
neglected foreign policy, it was now crushed and perturbed 
by it. The Archbishop of Toulouse had not been alone 
in discerning that the foreign policy for so long studied 
and practised by Mirabeau was the Tribune's "strong 
suit." Even his most violent adversaries did not dispute 
his superiority here. In all these grave questions, in which 
the most contradictory interests and ideas were stirred 

261 



MIRABEAU 

up, in which it was imperative neither to break with the 
past nor to go back on the Revolution, in which the 
supremacy of the people had both to repudiate and to 
appropriate the maxims and the methods employed by the 
supremacy of the King, Mirabeau adroitly intervened to 
produce from the indecision of confused debates the correct 
solution, the practical means, the formula of conciliation 
and action. Thus it was that, in the affair of the German 
Princes in Alsace, he had given his real conclusion, which 
had been hard to arrive at, on the report of the general 
committee, presented by Merlin de Douai, the jurist. He 
had secured the prevalence of the principle of the 
sovereignty of the nation throughout the French Empire, 
but only by acknowledging the right of the Princes of 
the Rhine to an indemnity (October 28, 1790). And again, 
on November 20, when he " muzzled a voracious Assembly " 
by a very simple proposition, he put an end to the 
"philosophical dissertations," dangerous in their con- 
sequences, which had been provoked by the situation of 
the town of Avignon and the county of Venaissin. 

But, among all the manifestations in which Mirabeau's 
foreign policy was shown, I must especially mention his 
report of January 28, 1791, which is rightly held to be his 
diplomatic masterpiece. Concise, cautious, and terribly 
perspicacious, this report is not unworthy of the unanimous 
success which it received, nor of the reputation which it 
has retained. Its optimism is only a subtle ingredient 
added to prepare and secure the measures of preserva- 
tion which the situation demanded. Italy, Austria, 
Germany, England are successively considered. What 
have these countries to gain by an unjust war ? If the 
Revolution gives them reason for fear, are not their very 
fears the pledge for France of their peaceful intentions ? 

Mirabeau concentrates his attention on England : she 
furnishes him with the most elaborate and important 
passage of his report. According to him Great Britain 

262 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

must hesitate between two policies : either she could lay 
down the broad basis of an eternal alliance, or wait upon 
events to place herself in a position to play a part or 
perhaps to stir up Europe. Which would she choose ? 
Union or intrigue ? She welcomed with enthusiasm the 
"great charter of humanity found in the ruins of the 
Bastille." How could she associate herself with a crusade 
against a people who to gain their liberty and a con- 
stitution had only followed her example ? But, on the 
other hand, the growing influence of Burke's Reflections 
on the French Revolution over English opinion did not 
escape Mirabeau's attention. The famous publicist had, 
with an indignation which flattered the national pride, 
rejected the alleged similarity between the revolution of 
1688 and that of 1789. Far from seeing any flattery in it, 
he repudiated it as an insult. Except for a few courageous 
and isolated minds his pamphlet had united the whole 
nation, which had not forgotten the American war, against 
France. When Mirabeau tried to separate Burke from 
the English people it is clear that his tactics outran his 
convictions. He was not afraid of an open war, for which 
there was no excuse or object, but his genius divined and 
denounced the "hidden manoeuvres, the secret methods of 
exciting disunion, playing off parties one against another, 
stirring up discord, to check our prosperity." It was 
necessary, then, to watch, "to reckon with the uncer- 
tainty of piudence, the tortuous ways of a false policy, 
and the obscurity which must ever cover a portion of the 
future." 

So the military, diplomatic, and investigatory com- 
mittees in joint session united in proposing a combination 
of measures calculated to "reassure the citizens of the 
country through the foresight of the law," and to extricate 
the country from the dangers by which it was beset. "Our 
policy is frank," said Mirabeau, "and we are proud of 
it; but so long as the conduct of other Governments is 

263 



MIRABEAU 

veiled with clouds, who can blame us for taking pre- 
cautions to maintain peace ? " The formula has not grown 
old. It has been the maxim of all Ministers for Foreign 
Affairs for a century under all forms of government. On 
October 12, 1789, Mirabeau inscribed the name of Talley- 
rand on the ministerial list for Foreign Affairs. It cannot 
be said that the choice lacked foresight. But his own 
reports are enough to prove the loftiness of outlook, the 
competence and skill with which he himself would have 
discharged these delicate duties. His instinct, or rather 
his knowledge of his own qualities, did not deceive him 
when in 1782 he declared his aptitude for a diplomatic 
career. Perhaps his taste for intrigue sometimes drew 
him into adventurous negotiations, but respect for national 
traditions and the application of revolutionary principles 
were combined in his mind with an easy force and a firm 
suppleness which, in truth, make it impossible to compare 
him with any other politician of his own time and country. 
But indeed was he not fitted to discharge the duties of any 
department of Government ? Immediately after he had read, 
in the name of the diplomatic committee, the report on the 
affairs of Spain, on August 27, he delivered a speech on 
the liquidation of the public debt, which he revised and 
developed in the form of a reply at the sitting of Septem- 
ber 27. These two speeches are to a large extent the work 
of his collaborator, the Genevese Reybaz, This has been 
proved by documents which leave no doubt on the matter. 
But, as was his custom, Mirabeau inspired the political 
thought. His thesis varied with circumstances. What- 
ever the efforts he may have made, even with the aid of 
inadequately quoted texts, to establish the continuity of 
his opinions on the question of assignats, he had to admit, 
if not to a contradiction, at least to the perturbation of an 
initial doubt which practically amounted to hostility. 
When, at a remote distance of time, we read again these 
cold financial dissertations, in which there is none of the 

264 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

fire of his speech on bankruptcy, it is impossible to convey- 
any understanding of the success they met with, except by 
finding an explanation in the political interests they 
served. Mirabeau has been accused of duplicity because, 
in his notes to the Court, he conveyed an idea of greater 
confidence than his speeches on the projected operations 
before the Assembly expressed. An impartial examination 
of the text does not permit me to join in any such severe 
judgment. In the tribune he invited his colleagues to do, 
in the public interest, "what seemed most advisable. We 
are acting like skilled physicians, if, while taking into 
consideration all the symptoms of the disease, we never- 
theless provide for the most urgent complaint." Was he 
very widely diverging from these words in saying to the 
Court : " Is it possible to vouch for the success of the 
assignats ? To that my answer must emphatically be, 
No. We can vouch for nothing in a kingdom like France, 
especially in circumstances in which so many different 
passions and so many prejudices are perpetually in 
conflict." 

His notes and his speeches then both affirm with equal 
force, not the guaranteed efficacy of the remedy, but the 
impossibility, without the assignats, of meeting obliga- 
tions and avoiding bankruptcy. 

When, on the meeting of the States-General, he said that 
"the deficit is the treasure of the nation," Mirabeau laid 
down a decisive principle. It defined and vindicated the 
rights which the financial situation would allow the nation 
to exercise over the monarchy. The assignats seemed to him 
now to be the "seal of the Revolution," as a means of 
increasing the number of its defenders, and of making 
friends of the Constitution of those cold men who, "see- 
ing only in revolutions in government revolutions of 
fortune," would be interested in defending operations 
which would place them in the position of creditors and 
beneficiaries. 

265 



MIRABEAU 

With this political end, which should not be condemned 
on the subsequent excesses for which Mirabeau was not 
responsible, was combined the desire to overthrow Necker, 
whose departure would have served both his rancour and his 
ambitions. From the day when in a violent fit of anger 
he said to Cerutti : " I will drive your idol out from before 
the nation ... I will one day lay his reputation lower 
than Calonne's, and his fortunes beneath those of Pan- 
chaud, . . ." he had never ceased to pursue him with 
sarcasm, contradiction and attack. The hour of his down- 
fall had at last arrived. Necker, who had been greatly 
shaken by Mirabeau's first speech on the assignats, did 
not wait to be asked to retire. On September 4 he sent 
in his resignation. Mirabeau thought once more that his 
hour had come. His twenty-sixth note to the Court, dated 
September 12, insisted again on the necessity of assur- 
ing unity of action in the administrative authority by 
rescinding the decree which made it impossible to take 
a Ministry from the National Assembly: "The mere 
presence of Ministers," he said, "would be an intermediary 
and a bond between powers which is easier to separate in 
theory than in practice." In favour of this thesis, which 
accorded with justice, the public interest and true principles, 
he drew up a line of strategy in which he wished to leave 
the initiative with the King, so as to give him the moral 
and political profit of its success. The King listened, 
approved and promised, but did not act, and Mirabeau's 
obstinacy, even though seconded by M. de La Marck, 
could not triumph over his incurable weakness. Mirabeau 
was no more successful in frustrating the influence of La 
Fayette, against whom, in his notes, he drew up plans in 
which his anxiety for public order and the authority of 
the Crown cannot excuse the violence of certain insults 
and the meanness of certain intrigues. It is true that his 
onslaughts were reciprocated. La Fayette was not satis- 
fied with uttering defamatory speeches against Mirabeau, 

266 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

speeches in which there was more vanity than political 
sense. It seems that he had failed to fulfil a formal pledge 
to support Mirabeau in the debate provoked by the inquiry 
into the events of October 5 and 6. The great orator's 
adversaries, aided by the partiality of the Commissioners, 
had waited for, this opportunity in the hope of discrediting 
him. La Fayette had promised to support him. He did 
not come. Fortunately Mirabeau was quite equal to 
defending himself. 

These proceedings, which had been instituted, or were at 
least inspired, with the purpose of crushing him, were the 
cause of one of his greatest successes. He displayed not 
only magnificent eloquence, but also incomparable presence 
of mind, self-possession, and lofty scorn. Before the 
debate was fully opened before the Assembly, numerous 
incidents occurred which turned to his advantage. As the 
Right seemed to fear that the revelation of what had passed 
would cause the flight of those inculpated, he cried : 
"It is just as probable that the witnesses as that the 
accused will disappear, and yet the accused are taking no 
measures to secure that the witnesses do not take to 
flight." 

The arrest of a certain M. de Riolles, a sort of secret 
agent who worked in the provinces, and who pretended to 
have had relations with Mirabeau, came near to causing 
grave doubts. Mirabeau turned this incident to account 
in an unforeseen argument. He reminded the Assembly 
that his notoriety, his misdeeds and his services, his mis- 
fortunes and his mistakes, had dragged him into all kinds 
of relations. And with the good-humour of a Titan taking 
human shape, he added : " My position is so strange : next 
week, as the Committee gives me to hope, there will be 
a report of an affair in which I played the part of a factious 
conspirator ; to-day I am accused of being a counter- 
revolutionary conspirator. Allow me to demand a divi- 
sion. Conspiracy for conspiracy, procedure for procedure, 

267 



MIRABEAU 

and, if need be, execution for execution, do at least let me 
be a revolutionary martyr." 

Far from being a martyr, he enjoyed a triumph, and 
never was triumph more deserved. He was acclaimed by 
the Left. In the adroitness of his pride he said: "I am 
not modest enough not to know that in the inquisition 
into the Revolution I must have a place." The debate 
of October 2 strengthened his position. Was it the turn- 
ing-point of his evolution ? It has been declared to be so. 
There is no doubt that Mirabeau approached the Jacobins. 
But, in judging his conduct, the ordinary standards must 
not be applied to a man of such rare complexity of 
character. "The Revolution," he had written to Mau- 
villon, "may no doubt still disintegrate into anarchy; but 
it will never fall back in favour of despotism." The whole 
of Mirabeau is in that sentence. It explains his apparent 
change of part while he remained faithful to his line of 
conduct. Anarchy is no more confounded in his mind 
with the Revolution than despotism with monarchy. Was 
he a traitor to the Revolution, as fervid spirits have accused 
him of being, when he denounced the military insurrection 
at Nancy and passed a vote of thanks to the defenders of 
law and order ? Was he a traitor to the King, as the 
moderates have reproached him with being, when with 
fierce indignation he condemned measures in which he 
discerned a desire to return to the old order ? Now on one 
side, now on the other, he "sturdily maintains the barrier " 
exposed by his very position to the blows of the extreme 
parties, and accused of self-contradiction by those whose 
passions he had refused to flatter or whose interests he 
would not serve. 

In his relations with the Court he too often lacked 
justice in his attacks on La Fayette and Necker. Ham- 
pered by their influence, cramped by their actions, embar- 
rassed by their hostility, he was too apt to see a sacrifice of 
the public interest in the frustration of his personal ambi- 

268 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

tions and the obstinacy of his rancour. But he is not always 
exaggerated in his portraits of his enemies, and his hatred 
does not always belie his insight. Above all it never 
obscured his acute sense of the necessities of the general 
situation. Mounier had said : "Let us never forget that we 
love the monarchy for France's sake, and not France for the 
monarchy's." It was for France and the Revolution that 
Mirabeau loved the monarchy and defended it. 

On September i he wrote to the King in almost the 
same terms as he afterwards wrote to Mauvillon : " Despot- 
ism is done with for ever in France. The Revolution may 
prove abortive, the Constitution may be subverted, the 
Kingdom torn to rags by anarchy, but there will never be 
one step backwards towards despotism." 

On September 3, being anxious about the part La 
Fayette was trying to play (or was accused of playing) in 
the events at Nancy, he advised the Court to make itself 
the mediator between the army and the people. 

On September 7 he praised the Assembly (23rd note) for 
having succeeded, in spite of so many obstacles, in draw- 
ing up a Constitution, "the advantages of which outweigh 
the defects," and at a time when "the laws are rather the 
work of the people than of their representatives," he con- 
gratulated the multitude on having had the wisdom "to 
regard obedience for the time being as the only possible 
rallying point of all parties." 

On September 12 in a note in which he tried to shake 
the King's inertia and to enlighten him as to his interests 
and his duty, he foretold the future with pitiless certainty : 
"The Assembly will administer more and more : it will 
govern : and if its efforts are attended with success, if 
this usurpation of power does not prove distasteful to the 
people, if so dangerous an example should be followed by 
other legislatures, monarchical government in France will 
be weaker than ever." 

His conception of a polity consisted in "the alliance 

269 



MIRABEAU 

of the principles of representative government with those of 
monarchical government." Therefore in the Constitution 
there must be maintained the "conquests common to the 
nation and the monarch," but there must be cut out of it 
"the republican ideas which make it a code of anarchy, 
civil dissensions and resistance to authority." For the 
necessary revision, which would consolidate the Revolution 
by protecting it against the consequences of its own 
mistakes, opinion must be prepared and won over, 
"changed before being strengthened, supported rather than 
excited." The Court should adopt a line of conduct which 
would not allow calumny to spread its poison : it should, 
frankly and openly, throw in its lot with the popular party, 
that is to say, with the party which is neither "of the 
people nor of the aristocracy." 

His advice made the greater impression on the Court 
inasmuch as Mirabeau, in blaming its inaction, did not 
hesitate to say that its conduct "ought not to consist either 
in doing nothing or in only allowing the action of injurious 
persons." He was questioned and invited to state his 
views more exactly, to say what he meant by the bases of 
the Constitution and the popular party, to explain how he 
understood the composition of a new Ministry, the idea 
of which he had set out more picturesquely than clearly. 
His answer to these questions was in the note of October 
14 : he made a bold summary of the ideas scattered through 
his previous consultations and he offered the Court a real 
programme of government. 

What were the bases of the Constitution? "The ruins 
of the old Constitution, the great ruins, the downfall of 
which has flattered the pride of the nation and served 
its interests." Privileges and pecuniary exemptions, dis- 
tinctions of class, feudalism, parlements, the orders of the 
nobility and the clergy, the States and the provincial bodies 
were abolished for ever. In their stead were established a 
hereditary sovereign, charged with the execution of the 

270 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

laws, the administration of the kingdom, the direction of the 
pubhc powers, and a permanent legislative body periodically- 
elected, to which the adjustment of the laws and the imposi- 
tion of taxes would be entrusted. The new division of the 
kingdom, free justice, the liberty of the press, responsibility 
of Ministers, the sale of the domanial and ecclesiastical 
estates were intangible measures and reforms which only 
limited the royal power in order to make it stronger. The 
Constitution had been built up of rough stones, without a 
keystone, and in dread of a reaction, with materials proper 
to a republic and a monarchy alike. It was time, instead 
of knocking it down, to give it the definite form of a 
"limited monarchy." 

What was the popular party to which the Court was to 
ally itself ? That which desired to maintain the Constitu- 
tion against the malcontents. The Court should "finally 
abandon the old magistracy, nobility and clergy," and 
give them no hope. Its strength would lie in the majority : 
" If you join that you will acquire the right and the power 
to direct it, and to direct is to govern." There was no 
need to be afraid of making the majority more formidable 
by supporting it. Danger lay rather in distrusting it and 
so engendering resistance. 

So far it is impossible to find a single inconsequence or 
contradiction in Mirabeau's words. Taking the whole 
thing, along its main lines, the Tribune's policy is here 
what it had always been. As M. de La Marck, who did 
not always approve, though he judged him with great 
insight, said, "Mirabeau desired the monarchy through 
the Revolution." 

Was it a new thing, was it interested audacity, for him 
to advise the Court, if the decree of interdiction was 
removed, to take a part at least of the new Ministers from 
among the Jacobins? As early as September 7, in a 
passage which has not been sufficiently commented on, he 
said : " It is impossible for the club of '89 (composed 

271 



MIRABEAU 

of moderates) not to have been for a long time regarded 
as anti-popular, simply because it cannot gain a success 
without joining the Right." Could Necker's Ministers, 
who had survived their leader's departure, follow other 
principles without incurring a deserved suspicion of 
hypocrisy ? In order to apply the principles of the 
Revolution to the improved Constitution, it was necessary 
to appeal to the revolutionaries. Do we not know that 
"the position of Minister changes a man entirely," and 
that "Jacobins as Ministers are never Jacobin Ministers. 
For any man elevation to a great position is a crisis which 
cures him of the faults he has and gives him others that 
he has not." In thus reassuring the King, who was being 
made fearful of extending the republican form to the 
whole kingdom, Mirabeau showed the depth of his political 
psychology. Louis XVI's tardiness in acting on his acute 
advice is no condemnation of it. Since the Revolution 
how many instances have there not been in the parliamen- 
tary system of the wisdom of placing "furious demagogues 
at the helm of affairs," who have been transformed by 
experience and responsibility into statesmen ? Mirabeau's 
only mistake was in reproaching La Fayette with "plotting 
with the leaders of the Jacobins for the success of a plan 
which the Jacobins had more reason to dread than any 
one." His hatred led him to blame in others what he him- 
self was advising : only in this can be found the contradic- 
tion, of which, quite rightly, complaint is made. 

Personally interested, though only through the most 
legitimate and noble ambition, Mirabeau's hostility to- 
wards the Ministers expressed the unanimous feeling of 
the Assembly and hastened the inevitable condemnation 
which only their retirement could help them to evade. 
Neither Champion de Cice, nor Saint-Priest, nor La Tour 
du Pin, nor Montmorin was big enough to fulfil the diffi- 
cult task in which Necker had failed. Had they not 
"during the six months' storm held aloof and let the ship 

272 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

of the State go down without touching a single sail or a 
single rope ? " Their indecision had ended in banding 
against them almost every party. The three committees 
of the Assembly had resolved to beg the King to form a 
new Ministry capable of carrying out its decrees. Mira- 
beau had not. been a stranger to this decision which he 
presented as a "great and fine measure," but he advised 
the King to anticipate its effect by dismissing his Ministers. 
He produced the most urgent reasons in favour of such 
an undertaking, some of which were in conflict with the 
thesis which he had maintained during the month of July 
1789. If there was some vacillation in his Constitutional 
doctrine, the advice he gave with great insistence was the 
result of a very wise and far-seeing political outlook. By 
following this advice the King would have been relieved 
of errors to which he was no party, and of which he was 
being made an accomplice. "In times of weakness it 
should be the policy of governments to yield without seem- 
ing to obey." Louis XVI never understood the necessity 
for such a policy as Mirabeau recommended, and, because 
he failed to yield in time, he had perpetually to submit to 
the humiliation of obedience. 

Following on a mutiny which had broken out at Brest 
on board a squadron just returned from the colonies, 
the diplomatic, colonial, military, and naval committees 
approached the Assembly with a number of resolutions, the 
chief of which contained an affirmation of the popular dis- 
trust of the Ministry and an order to substitute a flag 
with the national colours for the white ensign. Although 
the Ministry had lost the confidence of the Assembly, 
the orator of the Right, Cazal^s, who attacked them 
roundly, moved the rejection of this proposal on the 
ground of the royal prerogative. There was only a small 
majority. Mirabeau took no part in the debate. But he 
had a nice appreciation of its sense when he said that if 
the Ministry had won their cause by a nominal majority, 
T 273 



MIRABEAU 

the King had lost his. Once more he advised the King 
to anticipate the latent temper of the National Assembly 
and the imperious demands of public opinion by forc- 
ing the members of the Government, through an act of 
royal authority, to retire immediately. His influence 
with the Court, however, where his word had not yet 
succeeded in procuring a single energetic act, was even 
less than usual. A speech which does him honour was 
the cause of this discredit. At the sitting of October 21 
certain members of the Right had attacked the flag with 
the national colours, and one of them had gone so far as 
to say; "Leave the new tricoloured toy to children." 
Upon the provocation of such derision Mirabeau leapt to 
the tribune. Interrupted by the muttering of the Right, 
supported and excited by the unanimous applause and 
enthusiasm of the Left, he delivered a magnificent impro- 
visation in honour of the flag and of liberty, the Con- 
stitution and the Revolution. He reminded the Assembly 
that the supreme chief of the forces of the nation had 
already ordered the tricolour to be the national ensign. He 
denounced the white flag as the colour of the anti-revolution- 
ary party, and, addressing the Right, he hurled defiance : 
"D.o not lull yourselves to sleep in perilous security, 
for the awakening will be soon and terrible ! " Recollect- 
ing La Fayette's famous words, he gave them forth in a 
flashing oratorical shape, which electrified the Assembly : 
"The national colours will be borne over the high seas: 
they will obtain the respect of every country, not as the 
emblem of battle and victory, but as the emblem of the 
holy brotherhood of the friends of liberty throughout the 
world and as a terror to conspirators and tyrants ! " 

Was such language really, as the Comte de La Marck 
and the Archbishop of Toulouse declared, an outburst of 
his "demagogic instinct"? Was it a contradiction of his 
secret notes ? Had Mirabeau so far departed from his 
devotion to the Revolution that he had lost the right to 

274 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

defend its flag? Had he committed sacrilege in asking 
men on board the vessels of the State to cry : " Long live 
the nation, the law and the King " ? No incident more 
forcibly reveals the misunderstanding which existed be- 
tween Mirabeau and the Court. As long ago as the speech 
in which the Tribune repulsed the accusation of having 
shared in the events of October, the Queen had written to 
Mercy-Argenteau, who was abroad upon a mission : 
"With all his intellect and astuteness, I think he would be 
hard put to it to prove that he delivered that speech in 
order to serve us." A strange and unhappy illusion ! 
No. Mirabeau had not accepted the service of the Court 
against his principles in order to sacrifice the Revolution 
to the monarchy. The cry which he wished to have uttered 
on every vessel of the fleet was the affirmation not the 
negation of the doctrine which, since his profession of 
faith to Louis XVI, had been expressed in all his notes, 
all his consultations, all his advice. The King, the law, 
the nation : he had never had any other device, nor any 
other programme. When the royalists condemned his 
speech, they were thinking rather of what they had hoped 
than of what he had promised. They saw in him rather 
the defender of royalty than the orator of the Revolution, 
without seeing that he had never ceased to be both the 
one and the other. He explained himself with noble indig- 
nation, which did not condescend to any detailed explana- 
tion : "What!" he wrote to M. de La Marck, "those 
stupid idiots, drunk with a purely accidental success, offer 
you a counter-revolution, and you expect me not to pro- 
test ! Really, my friend, I have no desire to surrender 
my honour to anybody or my life to the Court ! I am a 
good citizen and I love fame, honour and liberty above all 
else, and, of course, these retrograde gentry will always find 
me ready to destroy them ! I am devoted to the re-estab- 
lishment of order, but not to the re-establishment of the 
old order." 

275 



MIRABEAU 

These angry and energetic words atone for many weak- 
nesses. Though he was bound to the Court and paid by 
it, Mirabeau maintained that he had not sold himself. 
At first sight the subtlety of the distinction is disconcert- 
ing. It becomes comprehensible and almost admissible 
when we know how Mirabeau had to resist plans which 
were not his own, and how he refused, even by silence, 
to betray the noble cause to which he had devoted his 
genius. "Show my letter," he wrote to the Comte de 
La Marck, who was hard put to it to explain his attitude. 
Far from withdrawing, he stuck to his point. Follow- 
ing on the disorder provoked at Belfort by certain officers, 
which he described as a crime against the nation, he 
declared : " It is very necessary to teach those who have 
dared to describe the national colours as a toy that revolu- 
tions are not children's games ! " (October 30). 

His notes to the Court echoed the same opinion. His 
bold insight did not mince his method of expression. To 
the King and the Queen he denounced "the priests and 
nobles, whose inertia when they ought to act and resist- 
ance when they ought to give way, have produced all the 
nation's misfortunes." He declared that their influence 
would always damage those whom they wished to serve, 
and he revealed the future in prophetic terms in one of 
his conclusions: "They are trying to weaken the popular 
party, but they will only give it new vigour, and by 
threatening us with a return to despotism, they will end 
by dragging us, in spite of ourselves, into a Republic. 
They are malcontents, but not good malcontents ! " He 
was trying to bring the King round to the "useful mal- 
contents," by which he meant well-meaning citizens, 
attached to order and liberty, who desired no despotism 
of any kind, and who were equally irritated by the excesses 
of the Assembly and the resistance of the Court. " If you 
are to coalesce with them," he said, "you must abandon 
the society of their enemies, the clergy, the landlords, the 
parlements, which no one has any desire to defend." 

276 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

Such advice weakened rather than added to Mirabeau's 
credit. In spite of its unhappy experiences, the Court 
persisted in illusions which concealed the truth and the 
only means of salvation. Louis XVI did not understand, 
and even if Marie Antoinette had been capable of any 
concerted plan, she could neither supervise nor assure its 
execution, since she had no one in the council to represent 
and aid her. On this point M. de La Marck thought 
with Mirabeau : "So long as that is so," he wrote to the 
Comte de Mercy-Argenteau, "we shall always fail in the 
simplest project, or rather we shall be unable to attempt 
anything." 

The real or supposed presence in Paris of Mme. de 
Lamotte, the intriguing and dangerous heroine of the affair 
of the necklace, roused Mirabeau's "audacious devotion." 
The Queen was in danger. Tempted by the chivalrous 
attitude, he declared that he "would perish at the stake 
in such an affair and for anything concerning the august 
and interesting victim who was the object of so rnany 
villainous slanders." He expressed himself with a pas- 
sionate and clear-sighted zeal which won him the gratitude 
of the Queen and, once more, her confidence. However, 
the threats and the treachery which he feared were not 
forthcoming. 

Another incident followed, in which it is not so easy 
to explain his conduct. After the duel in which Charles 
de Lameth was wounded by M. de Castries, the angry mob 
burst into the latter's house and sacked it. A debate took 
place in the Assembly in a heated and excited atmosphere. 
Mirabeau was touched by the general emotion. There is 
not a word of condemnation of the outrage to be found in 
the vehement speech he pronounced. Rather is it excused. 
Malouet had given up to Mirabeau his turn to speak on 
condition that he, as likely to obtain a better hearing, would 
propose and more easily carry the same measures. The 
violent tone which the Tribune adopted from the outset let 
loose passion and insult. The Right shouted threats at the 

277 



MIRABEAU 

orator. " What would you ? " said Mirabeau to Malouet, 
as he came down from the tribune. "I could not fall into 
line with people whose only desire is to see me hanged " 
(November 13). 

This "incendiary speech," as M. de La Marck called it, 
had a great effect on the Queen. Mirabeau was less sure 
of himself and less proud of his attitude than he had been 
after the affair of the tricolour, and tried to justify himself : 
"One has to adopt dissimulation," he said, "when one is 
trying to outdo force with cunning, just as one has to bend 
and turn before a storm." It was a halting explanation, 
and he felt its weakness, for he added that such a principle 
was opposed to his natural character. 

He was nearer the truth when he invoked another maxim. 
"I must first take the diapason of those whom I wish to 
bring into harmony with my own." He had lost his own 
diapason in the Castries affair. Before the Jacobin society 
of which he had been a member since its foundation and 
which he had sometimes neglected, though he had never 
entirely deserted it, he found words more worthy of him- 
self, words which are the more meritorious when we 
consider the excitement of his audience. He was elected 
president, and on November 30 delivered a speech in which 
he declared public order to be "one of the greatest of 
benefits and the constant support of liberty." As an 
opponent of all factions, he proclaimed the necessity of 
making all Frenchmen "enemies of licence and the friends 
and servants of peace." Such words are enough to justify 
his having allied himself with a society which was no doubt 
advanced in its views, though its different periods must not 
be confounded and it must be remembered that Robes- 
pierre's influence only predominated after Mirabeau's 
death. Without its popularity, without the confidence of 
the people, Mirabeau's genius would not have suffered 
him, as he said himself, to plunge successfully into the 
lists. His relations with the club of the Friends of the 

278 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

Constitution were necessary for him to be able to act. I 
do not understand why those relations should have been 
cast up against him as a contradiction or a backsliding. 
They were in accordance with the advice he gave to the 
King : " Whether I be strong or weak in fencing," he 
said, "I must have a solid footing." He tried to "force 
the Jacobins insensibly to approach the Court." As 
Ministers they would have been forced to compromise. 
The misfortunes of the kingdom, as to which the exercise of 
power would leave them no illusion, would reveal to them 
the insufficiency of the royal authority. If they were 
bidden to consolidate their work, they would feel the 
necessity of correcting it. It being to their interest to 
remain faithful to them, their partisans, even while they 
thought themselves immovable in their opinions, would 
gradually relax their hold of their principles, and against 
their will, without knowing it, they would change. Un- 
compromising morality will call this a Machiavellian 
scheme liaving no care for adapting the means to the end. 
But the political experience of all ages will recognize it as 
profound psychology and the necessity of handling men 
through human feelings. 

The Jacobins of whom Mirabeau cried : " Name them 
all ! All ! " did not become Ministers. But, if the 
Tribune's desires failed, his prophecies on another point 
were realized : impotent to hold their ground, Necker's 
Ministers, who had held out for varying periods, were 
forced, one by one, to retire. In spite of Mirabeau's efforts 
their successors were appointed by La Fayette. Not only 
were the men indicated by the Tribune not chosen, but 
he bitterly complained that in the formation of the new 
Ministry there was not a single man in whom he had 
any confidence, or who could serve as a bond between 
legitimate authority and those who, like himself, were 
devoting their energies to defending it. M. de Mont- 
morin, Minister for Foreign Affairs, had alone survived 

279 



MIRABEAU 

the general disaster. Mirabeau had only too many reasons 
for not considering him as an intermediary. 

M. de Montmorin, a victim of the general fatality which 
seemed to hang over all Louis XVI's Ministers, was 
entirely lacking in character at a time when considered and 
determined judgment and will were more than ever neces- 
sary to make up for the absence of genius in an unparal- 
leled crisis. He was vacillating whenever he had to make 
up his mind, terrified by the responsibilities of his office, 
flung this way and that by the violent struggles between 
opinions and men, and yet, in spite of everything, he was 
determined to remain a Minister, and with more pliancy 
than dignity he bent before the changes of attitude which 
the fluctuations of events demanded of his timorous and 
uneasy indecision. Attached in the beginning to the 
fortunes of Necker, he had with haughty and imprudent 
disdain rejected Mirabeau's proposals. La Fayette's popu- 
larity had then attracted him, and, while his colleagues 
were being shipwrecked on their incapacity, he succeeded 
in maintaining enough sympathy in the Assembly to pro- 
cure his formal exclusion from the motion to dismiss the 
Ministry. This "shameful " exemption had irritated Mira- 
beau, who saw in the motion a manoeuvre on the part of 
La Fayette. In his notes he had combated it with great 
vigour, either because of his supposed subordination to the 
General, or, more plausibly, because of the gravity of the 
foreign situation. This situation furnished him with the 
subject for one of those wide surveys in which, as he 
watched events abroad as well as those at home, he was a 
past master: "Because we are in a fever," he said, "we 
think we are possessed of unusual vigour : because we are 
sick, other nations think we are dying. We and they are 
mistaken ! " 

As La Fayette's popularity was visibly on the wane, 
M. de Montmorin turned towards Mirabeau. He sent and 
suggested an understanding. Mirabeau, whose relations 

280 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

with the Court were at the time rather cool, was justly 
suspicious, and would not pledge himself until he knew 
the opinion of the Queen, who had never treated the 
Minister for Foreign Affairs with favour. He informed 
the Queen of his first conversation with M. de Montmorin. 
Just as after Mirabeau's death he was miserably to betray 
these relations to win the confidence of Lameth. M. de 
Montmorin, in order to win Mirabeau's support, though 
he had a vague suspicion of his relations with the Court, 
now deserted La Fayette. On the excuse, in which no 
doubt there was some sincerity, of saving the King and the 
nation, but also his own portfolio, by the transfer of 
authority, he appealed to the Tribune with extravagant 
praise of his talent and glory. He suggested a coalition 
to draw up a plan for the Assembly, to supervise the elec- 
tions, and to restore a certain measure of her popularity 
to the Queen, whose confidence he counted on Mirabeau to 
procure for him (December 5). The Queen acquiesced in 
these proposals. M. de Montmorin's chief anxiety was to 
obtain from Mirabeau a concerted plan which should 
exactly determine the means to be employed for the realiza- 
tion of their common aims. Mirabeau set to work, drew 
up and sent to the Court on December 22 and 23 his forty- 
seventh note, of which the very title is a programme : 
Survey of the situation in France and the means of recon- 
ciling the public liberty with the royal authority. 

It is on this, the longest, the most searching, and, all 
things considered, the most important of all the memoranda 
he wrote, that Mirabeau's policy is usually judged. It has 
become Mirabeau's witness before the tribunal of history. 
The point of view is clear and precisely stated, but it is 
not by any means exclusive. It must not be forgotten 
that at the time when he sent this memorandum, to the 
Comte de La Marck, Mirabeau had already been for seven 
months the adviser of the Court. He had given his 
opinion, not only on the general situation, which he had 

281 



MIRABEAU 

envisaged under its every aspect and in all its conse- 
quences, but even on the particular facts which were bound 
up in it. His advice was not followed. "Being always 
limited to advice and never allowed to act," he said, "I 
shall probably meet the fate of Cassandra : I shall always 
prophesy truly and shall never be believed." These words, 
which he wrote in a very different situation, exactly fit the 
welcome which his proposals received at the Court. It 
would therefore be absolutely unjust to judge his opinions 
and projects only on a programme which had caused so 
many vain efforts and such a succession of disappoint- 
ments. The King's inertia and uncertainty had aggra- 
vated the evil for which the sovereign was demanding a 
remedy of Mirabeau. Already, during the month of May, 
Mirabeau found that things had been allowed most 
disastrously to drift from bad to worse. In December he 
had reason to think that the situation was irreparable. 
With undaunted courage he clung to his task. 

This forty-seventh note was drawn up in a fortnight. 
It betrays his haste only by an absence of method which 
constrained the author to repeat himself. He faces the 
obstacles in the way before fixing the end. There is 
little risk of falsifying his ideas, which I desire to set 
forth clearly and soberly, if we begin by first of all estab- 
lishing what Mirabeau wished to maintain, and what he 
advised the King to alter, and then determine the 
obstacles which he dreaded and the means he wished to 
employ. 

The Revolution had given the nation imperishable 
benefits and irrevocable conquests. "A whole generation 
would need to perish, twenty-five million men to be robbed 
of their memory," before it were possible to deprive them 
of their hopes and the fruits of their efforts. Even an 
armed counter-revolution could not force the French nation 
to return to the old order. "The kingdom might be re- 
conquered, but the conqueror would have to compound 

282 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

with public opinion, make sure of the goodwill of the 
people, confirm the destruction of old abuses, admit the 
people to the making of the laws, and allow them to choose 
their own administrators." 

The destruction carried out by the Revolution was 
almost equally useful to the nation and to the monarch ; 
its consequences must be maintained. By destruction 
Mirabeau meant, the abolition of all privileges, all pecu- 
niary exemptions, feudalism, the disastrous taxes, the 
provincial bodies and the States, the parlements, the clergy 
and the owners of fiefs, in so far as they constituted 
political bodies. In the same way it was necessary to 
maintain unity of taxation, the liberty of the press, the 
freedom of religious opinion, the admissibility of all 
citizens to all employments, the supervision of the public 
funds, the equitable dispensation of favours and pecuniary 
grants. These were the benefits of the Revolution : they 
were intangible. They were opposed by the nobility and 
the clergy, who had fallen into such discredit that "if the 
Court wished to recover some of its influence, it must be 
very careful to give no ground for an idea that it wished 
to serve them." 

Hence what was needed was not a counter-revolution 
but a wise and temperate counter-constitution. The funda- 
mental principles of the Constitution responded to the will 
and the needs of the nation, which desired the hereditary 
kingship with a permanent representative body. These 
bases were essential and indestructible. But peculiar 
circumstances had forced on the Assembly a certain 
deviation from the principles which it had wisely pro- 
pounded. Thus it had reached a confused mixture of 
democracy, aristocracy and monarchy. Through fear of 
the opposition of the malcontents and the resistance of 
the Court, through fear of a return to the former despotism, 
it had exaggerated the influence of the people and exces- 
sively diminished the authority of the King. "It has not 

283 



MIRABEAU 

perceived that it was in this way establishing a kind of 
democracy without destroying the monarchical govern- 
ment, or that it was making the monarchy useless without 
establishing a genuine democracy." It had weakened and 
almost destroyed the executive power, by depriving the 
King of the rights which should belong to him in the 
making of the laws, the administration of the kingdom and 
the use of the public forces. It had multiplied organisms 
between which there was neither sufficient co-ordination 
nor interdependence. Therefore every effort must be made 
to procure a better Constitution which should put every 
power in its proper place, and by giving each its proper 
function restore its rights and its means of action. 

This programme on all essential points respected the 
sense of public opinion. Its progressive application would 
bring back to the Revolution "those who wish for liberty 
and monarchical government, applaud the National 
Assembly for having destroyed a number of abuses, 
and blame it for having disorganized the whole empire, 
retained for itself all the power and destroyed the royal 
authority." 

But, wise though it was, and perhaps even because it 
took up a stand between the opposing extremes, this pro- 
gramme would have to face many obstacles. By enumerat- 
ing them and saying how it was possible to triumph over 
them, Mirabeau pointed out some of the means of action 
which he regarded as available. 

The boldness with which, in writing to the Court, he 
noted, among the obstacles to be surmounted, the King's 
indecision and the measures to be taken to control the 
Queen, is astonishing. To put an end to the King's in- 
decision he counted on the concert of the Ministers in the 
Council and the influence of the Queen in his private life. 
At bottom it is easy to understand that Louis XVI's 
character seemed to him the most formidable danger, and 
at the same time that for which it was most difficult to find 

284 




MIRABEAU IN 179T 

(J^roni a miniatjtre by J . Leiiioine belonging to M. B'. Flanicng) 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

a remedy. Only the Queen had, up to a point, any influ- 
ence over him. But there was no longer any barrier round 
the throne, and it was for the throne itself to reassure public 
opinion as to its intentions, which the factious were dis- 
torting and turning into an offensive weapon. A spark 
might be enough to produce the threatened conflagration. 
Therefore "the Queen's public conduct must take another 
course : she must make herself agreeable to the multitude 
with an enlightened bounty just as her personal charm has 
won over those who surround her, and the Ministers must 
associate her with whatever they do to further the Revolu- 
tion, and invest her with all their popularity." 

Mirabeau had wide views, expressed in brilliant passages 
or picturesque formulse, of the "frantic demagogy" of 
Paris, which there was no hope of modifying, though it 
must be used to detach the provinces from the capital, of 
the dangers of the National Guard, of the irritability of the 
Assembly, which was too numerous and had become a 
sort of theatre, and of the different classes of malcontents. 
The whole thing forms a gloomy picture, vivid in every 
detail, while certain portions of it are terribly prophetic. 

All these obstacles being either removed, or diminished, 
or regarded as more proper to be avoided than surmounted, 
how was the " reformation " of the Constitution to be 
compassed ? Mirabeau repudiated every legislative act 
that emanated only from the King. Such initiative would 
hopelessly alienate the mind of the people and would be 
an irrevocable signal for civil war: "There is nothing to 
be done, nothing to be attempted, except we are convinced 
of this truth." 

It only remained then to address the Assembly of the 
representatives of the people. Which ? Should the at- 
tempt to correct the Constitution be made by the actual 
Assembly or by the second legislature ? Mirabeau did not 
think it possible to obtain from the existing Assembly the 
extensive reform he considered necessary, or that its spirit 

285 



MIRABEAU 

of abnegation could be expected to go so far as to recognize 
its own mistakes and to face the sacrifice of popularity en- 
tailed by their reparation. Public opinion should be pre- 
pared for a change, and "for the return of the torrent which 
had burst its banks to its bed," it was not desirable to risk 
the success of the enterprise by a precipitancy which would 
not allow of adequate and systematic preparations. 

But how were they to deal with the existing Assembly ? 
It might rest with itself to make the revision of the con- 
stitutional laws impossible for the next Assembly either 
by decreeing that the Constitution should not be ratified, 
or by ordering that there should not be a second constituent 
power until a fixed time. Mirabeau opposed this twofold 
danger with a plan which can be left unexpounded with- 
out injury to his general conception. It was to be feared 
from the existing Assembly that, by reason of its growing 
influence, it would so powerfully attach the mind of the 
people to its work that it could not be modified. In order 
to lessen this influence Mirabeau suggested a series of 
measures. First of all, two decrees : one interdicting the 
re-election of members of the Assembly, and the other, 
for the forthcoming legislature, forbidding the election of 
candidates as deputies in departments other than those in 
which they lived. A second series of measures aimed at 
provoking dissension among the leaders of the Assembly 
by deluding them with the hope of being made Ministers 
after the revocation of the decree of November 7, "and if 
it was not enough to flatter their ambition in order to 
seduce them, there were other means, and I have left none 
unconsidered, which should win more success." Finally, 
to determine a variation in the thermometer of public 
opinion, and to provoke its hostility against the Assembly, 
its path must be trapped, it must be deceived, ruined, made 
unpopular, and when it has been reduced to impotency, 
its downfall must suddenly be precipitated. It was not 
enough to make use of its mistakes : it must be led to 

286 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

commit mistakes, "influenced to turn its attention towards 
useless undertakings or unpopular questions : it must be 
led, without being supported or opposed, to issue every 
kind of decree which could add to the number of the mal- 
contents ... it must be embarrassed in its action in order 
to show its weakness and impotence : excited in its jealousy 
to rouse that of the administrative bodies; and finally it 
must be led more and more to usurp every kind of power 
so as to make its tyranny dreaded." To these general in- 
dications, of which I have given the salient features, Mira- 
beau added detailed plans for separating the provinces from 
the capital, for exciting the inter-rivalry of the administra- 
tive bodies, for provoking popular petitions, for rousing by 
a bad system of taxation "that kind of blind instinct which 
has led the people to believe that the Revolution consists 
in giving them nothing to pay," and finally for organizing 
a systematic warfare by the King's Ministers on the 
decrees of the Assembly. 

When the Assembly had thus been discredited, weak- 
ened and rendered impotent, it must be succeeded by a 
legislature which, having other views, should have both 
the power and the will to alter the Constitution. The 
influence which should be turned in this direction should 
win over the National Assembly, Paris and the provinces. 

In the National Assembly M. de Montmorin would be 
the central figure of a coalition comprising — for otherwise 
co-operation would be suspected — MM. de Bonnay, the 
Abbe de Montesquiou and Cazal^s, of the Right, and other 
deputies of the constitutional group and the popular party : 
Clermont-Tonnerre, d'Andre, Duquesnoy, the Bishop of 
Autun, Emmery, Le Chapelier and Barnave. Only M. de 
Montmorin and Mirabeau would know of this secret con- 
solidation, and, by most often deceiving the men they 
employed, would determine their individual action so as 
to make them contribute to the desired end. 

To control Paris Mirabeau suggested the organization of 

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MIRABEAU 

a police bureau, entrusted to Talon and Semonville, so as 
to influence the National Guard, the administrative body 
and the tribunals, the electoral bodies and the sections, 
public opinion, periodical publications and the tribune of 
the National Assembly. 

To control the provinces an office for correspondence 
must be instituted, composed of two staffs of travellers, the 
plan of which was drawn up by Mirabeau with the most 
precise details of their organization and their methods of 
action and communication. 

Finally, to win over the Assembly, Paris and the 
Provinces all together, the note indicates how, under the 
direction of Clermont-Tonnerre, a publishing office was to 
be started and set in working order. 

"There is every hope," says Mirabeau, "if this plan is 
carried out; if it is not, then any disaster may be locked 
for." And he ends with a patriotic invocation to the "good 
but weak King and the unfortunate Queen," whom he was 
trying to save at the risk of his own ruin. 

How are we to judge this famous plan ? It is too varied 
and complex, and it shows too great a divergence between 
the end and the means to be submitted to an appreciation 
aiming only at approbation or condemnation. "Unhappy 
nation!" cried Mirabeau. "A few men who have sub- 
stituted intrigue for talent and movements for conceptions 
have led you to this ! " Was he not, in his turn, offering 
the country, in the strangest juxtaposition, talent and 
intrigue, profound conceptions and doubtful movements ? 
So long as he was exposing the trouble, the anarchy of the 
kingdom, the conflict of the various Powers, the follies of 
the Assembly, the dangerous (to public order) weakness of 
the executive power, he was admirable both in thought and 
expression. When he pointed out the remedy, and indi- 
cated the inalienable conquests of the Revolution and the 
defects in the Constitution which needed correction, his 
foresight proved the vast range of his genius. But his 

288 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

methods of execution were as morally blameworthy as they 
were practically dubious. His plan of debasing the 
Assembly, of leading it into disaster, of laying traps for it, 
was disconcertingly and repellently unscrupulous. Was 
it excusable, under pretext of fighting intrigue and ambi- 
tion, to use means which he himself described as "obscure 
intrigue and artful dissimulation " ? Could the salvation 
of the country depend upon such dangerous weapons 
placed in the hands of the police in order to discredit an 
Assembly, divide parties and agitate public opinion ? And 
what lamentable inconsequence ! It was Mirabeau who, 
in an irresistible speech, had caused the rejection of the 
dangerous proposal to forbid the re-election of deputies. 
And here he was in a secret note suggesting the idea and 
advising the Court to act on it ! Such advice was not fated 
to be lost. When, a few days after Mirabeau's death, the 
Assembly refused to listen to Duport's judicious argu- 
ments, and "yielding to the exaggeration of public ideas," 
and hearkening to the already menacing voice of Robes- 
pierre, the Right, encouraged by the Queen, did not fail 
to fall in with such a stupidly suicidal policy. So it was 
fated that Mirabeau's advice should only be followed by 
the Court in one instance, that which, the insight of his 
genius being obscured, led him to deal the Revolution one 
of the most terrible blows it suffered ! 

But could his plan have succeeded ? Hardly was it set 
on foot than it encountered the most serious difficulties. 
The Ministers had not been informed, but their assistance, 
inspired and directed by Montmorin, was indispensable. 
They opposed projects of which they knew nothing. The 
only result, and that a poor one, was obtained, apparently, 
by the policy of Talon, who, for a time, created an 
atmosphere about the Court that was less passionately 
hostile. The rest did not work or was not even tried. 
The Comte de Mercy saw at once the weakness of the plan 
which had roused the Queen to enthusiasm. He recog- 
u 289 



MIRABEAU 

nized its value in theory; but the practical difficulties 
seemed to him to be insurmountable, "because/' he wrote, 
"it demands the co-operation of men equal in power to 
him who laid down their plan of action." That was the 
decisive objection. M. de La Marck shared the feeling. 
He too had been struck by the "brilliance and profundity " 
of Mirabeau's projects, but he added: "This plan seems 
to have been drawn up for other times and other men. 
Cardinal de Retz, for instance, might have carried it out; 
but we are no longer living in the days of the Fronde." 
M. Albert Sorel, who quotes this characteristic apprecia- 
tion, says that "Mirabeau was not looking back, but for- 
ward. When he seemed to combine, in a sort of terrifying 
resurrection, P6re Joseph, Machiavelli and Richelieu, he 
was simply predicting the consulate of Bonaparte and the 
Ministry of Fouche ! " Now Louis XVI was not Bona- 
parte and M. de Montmorin was not Fouche. When the 
King was spoken to about his affairs and position, "it was 
like talking to him about things relating to the Emperor 
of China." The reflection is M. de Montmorin's. What 
force that Minister would have needed to be able to shake 
such passivity ! But he was, on the contrary, timorous, 
undecided, without will or method. How could Mirabeau 
hope to succeed with such coadjutors ? In a position to 
act, to direct and supervise everything, he would no doubt 
have partially succeeded. But his unavowed position and 
his secret power compelled him to rely on men devoted to 
intrigue and men of mediocre powers. "We need," he 
wrote on December 27, "a sort of political pharmacy in 
which the controller alone, being provided with both 
simples and poisonous plants, should be able to prescribe 
his remedies absolutely independent of anything save his 
own genius and encouraged by the entire confidence of the 
patient." Nothing could be better than this metaphorical 
confession for showing the impossibility of an undertaking 
in which the genius who had conceived it had not reserved 

290 



RELATIONS WITH THE COURT 

for himself its direction and execution. It was so com- 
plicated, and m its execution so contradictory and tortuous 
that Mirabeau himself could not escape falling into the 
traps he had laid. He was the victim of the strange 
political pharmacy" he had composed. For some time 
his action was poisoned and paralyzed by it. 



291 



CHAPTER XV 

THE LAST THREE MONTHS 

The application of the ecclesiastical oath : Mirabeau's embarrassment — 
His Presidency of the National Assembly — " Silence, you thirty ! " 
— The law relating to emigration — The Jacobins' sitting of February 
27, 1791 — Death of Mirabeau. 

It was at the time of the commencement of the civil Con- 
stitution of the Clergy that the Court, struck by the contra- 
dictions in Mirabeau's attitude, began to suspect him of 
duplicity. Mirabeau had been silent during the course 
of the debates which had prepared the way for this perilous 
undertaking. No doubt he wished neither to compromise 
his popularity by opposing the Constitution of the Clergy, 
nor, by supporting it, to estrange the King, whose 
susceptibility was greater in religious questions than in 
political questions proper. The National Assembly had 
made a clumsy mistake in meddling with affairs that did 
not come within the scope of the civil authority. It was 
impossible to reproach it with not having exceeded its 
mandate and with not having anticipated times and 
manners by decreeing the separation of the two powers. 
But the civil Constitution which it had drawn up was so 
violently opposed to ecclesiastical discipline that its execu- 
tion could not fail to produce conflict and what Edgar 
Quinet, whose criticism is so exalted, calls "a fury in the 
dark." Mirabeau contributed to this fury. At the time 
when he was supporting the suppression of tithes, he 
had pronounced himself in favour of a salaried clergy. 
The Assembly had organized a constituted clergy by its 
decree of June 17, 1790. The Pope, who by this Con- 

292 



THE LAST THREE MONTHS 

stitution was robbed of the right to nominate bishops and 
to dehmit the episcopal sees, stirred up a resistance which 
took shape in the Exposition of the principles of the civil 
Constitution of the clergy, signed by one hundred and 
thirty-nine bishops. Trouble followed, especially in Brit- 
tany, and necessitated the intervention of the Assembly. 
The Assembly on November 26 was presented with a 
report by Voidel in the name of the united committees 
on the alienation of ecclesiastical property. 

Mirabeau took part in the debate. He had informed the 
Comte de La Marck that, to avoid a religious war, he was 
prepared to accept any "pacific, conciliatory" measure of 
negotiation. But at the same time he declared that he 
was "compelled to keep to a certain tone in order to reserve 
the power of concession," and would deliver a vigorous 
speech. There certainly was vigour in his speech, and 
amid theological dissertations which owed much to the 
competence of the Abbe Lamourette, there was a sort of 
prejudiced violence against the bishops in the Assembly 
who had inspired the Exposition. Were the measures which 
Mirabeau proposed more moderate ? Throughout there 
was no mention of anything but forfeitures, and resigna- 
tions and suppressions of stipends, and prosecutions for 
crimes against the nation. One provision was especially 
serious. While the scheme presented by Voidel was only 
directed towards the ecclesiastics in the exercise of their 
salaried functions, Mirabeau forbade any priest to ad- 
minister confession unless he had first of all taken the 
civic oath before his municipality. This meant the exten- 
sion to the private acts of free ecclesiastics of the obliga- 
tions and sanctions which the report of the committees 
had only recommended in the case of "constituted " priests. 
However, the Abb^ de Pradt, the Bishop of Perpignan, 
and even M.de Fontanges, before Mirabeau's speech, which 
they thought detestable, had not been frightened by his 
proposals. The reason was that, as no date had been fixed 

293 



MIRABEAU 

for their execution, these proposals left the way open for 
delay, discussion and negotiation. But the violence of 
Mirabeau's speech compromised his tactics, and theTribune 
was the victim of his own excessive cleverness. Voidel's 
plan was carried. It compelled the ecclesiastics without 
delay to return to their own homes and take the civil oath. 

His moderation, concealed beneath aggressive language, 
not having succeeded, Mirabeau found himself in an awk- 
ward position, and remained silent on the ecclesiastical 
question for several weeks, and did not break out again 
until the beginning of the year 1791. On January i, as 
he gave his consent to a motion by Barnave to assure the 
execution of the decree of November 27, he tried to explain 
that the refusal of the oath was incompatible with a public 
function, but that any priest who refused it would be con- 
sidered simply as having sent in his resignation without 
incurring any other sanction. He added that the Assembly 
had not trenched on the spiritual domain. But on 
January 4, on the occasion of the disturbances excited in 
his parish by the cur^ of Peronne, he secured a series 
of measures aiming at the facilitation of the election 
of bishops and cures and the nomination of vicars. In 
this way he sought to avoid a too long interruption of the 
ministration of religion, which every wise citizen would 
regard "as the eclipse of an influence very necessary to the 
patriotic zeal of the people," and to deprive the enemies 
of the Revolution of a means of turning public opinion 
against it by denouncing it as having attacked the "power 
of their religion, its worship and its hopes." 

These two speeches were the expression of a very wise 
idea which led Mirabeau to seek rather to calm disaffection 
than to aggravate it, and to facilitate peace rather than to 
excite hostilities. Were they not thus in contradiction to 
Mirabeau's plan for urging the necessity and possibility 
of a remedy through the very excess of the evil ? The 
Comte de La Marck pointed this out to him and amicably 

294 



THE LAST THREE MONTHS 

reproached him with not having let the Assembly "fall 
into the snare." Mirabeau replied that "if the Assembly 
thought the resignation of twenty thousand cur^s would 
have no effect on the kingdom, it must be looking through 
queer spectacles." Although he had had no part in the 
deliberations of the ecclesiastical committee he was entrusted 
with an address to the French nation on the civil Constitu- 
tion of the clergy, and he read it aloud on January 14. On 
this occasion he drifted into rather than assumed violence, 
and expressed himself in a manner which gave such offence 
to both the Right and to certain members of the majority 
that he could not finish the reading. It needed nothing 
less than his admirable report of January 28 on the foreign 
situation to extricate him from this unfortunate set-back. 

M. de La Marck insisted on the execution of that part of 
the plan which aimed at "undermining" the Assembly, 
and urged him once more to profit by the question of the 
clergy to add to the discredit of the legislature. Mirabeau 
sent two notes to the Court (January 21 and 24) to this in- 
tent, and it is impossible to read them without pain. In 
order to increase the number of the malcontents and to 
"store up combustible matter for the fire," he suggests a 
whole series of measures set forth in precise detail. But, 
by a strange contradiction, in the Assembly he opposed 
the attitude of the Abbe Maury and Cazales, who, uncon- 
sciously, were in favour of the plan he had drawn up. 

Mirabeau 's restless incoherence during all these debates 
is too glaringly in contrast with the serious importance 
of the religious question not to occasion astonishment 
and regret. His capacity for intrigue submerged his 
political instinct just at the very moment when he needed 
it most. Mirabeau would have done better, if it was im- 
possible for him to have the courage of his convictions, to 
persist in a silence which would have been less injurious 
than his speeches to the public service and to his own repu- 
tation. He thought and wrote better than he acted : 

295 



MIRABEAU 

" Here," he said in a letter of January 27, " is a new sore, the 
most inflamed and festered of all, which will add yet another 
gangrene to those which are burning into, corroding and 
dissolving the body politic. We had made ourselves a King 
in effigy, without power, and a legislative body which ad- 
ministers, informs, judges, rewards, punishes, does every- 
thing but what it ought to do. Now we are setting up 
religious schism side by side with political schism. We 
had not enough trouble, but we must rouse more : not 
enough dangers, but we must evoke the worst of all : not 
enough difficulties, but we must raise the most insurmount- 
able : we shall bring about the end of all things if the 
Assembly does not soon grow weary of obeying the 
anarchists ! " There could not be a firmer or more clear- 
sighted statement of the case. That the same maa should 
have written so noble a letter and should have contradicted 
it by his conduct, that he should so clearly have foreseen 
the danger of religious schism and should have contri- 
buted to it, is a most disconcerting problem in political 
psychology. Nothing can solve it except the Marquis de 
Mirabeau's judgment of his son : "He is all contrasts." 

But the part Mirabeau had played in the question of 
the clergy did not satisfy him. He felt that he had yielded 
too much to his desire to maintain his popularity, or that 
he had weakened his attitude by too much subtlety and 
ill-understood niceties. The courageous good sense which 
he had shown in his letter prevailed and, on March 2, 
in a few significant words he expressed the same opinion 
in the tribune : "The fact is," he said, "we are giving far 
too much attention to the clergy : we should be concerned 
with other things now than the question of giving them 
their pensions and letting them sleep in peace." 

At the beginning of the year 1791 Mirabeau's popularity 
was immense. The people of Paris were grateful for his 
services and proud of his genius. Mirabeau had become 
a national glory. The Chaussee d'Antin district, where he 

296 



THE LAST THREE MONTHS 

had set up house and lived a recklessly gorgeous life, 
appointed him on January i8 chief of a battalion of the 
National Guard. His delight was the greater in that La 
Fayette had opposed his election. Also he hoped that 
his office, by giving him "the advantage of going with 
Monseigneur the Dauphin on his walks," would also give 
him the advantage of meeting the Queen, with whom he had 
in vain sought a second interview. He was disappointed 
in this hope. But the Assembly accorded him an honour 
which repaired his discomfiture. 

Since its convocation it had had forty-two presidents, 
a few of them famous, some well known, others very 
mediocre. It was high time to summon to the chair 
the orator of geniuS whose fight for liberty had redeemed 
the errors of a restless and adventurous life. At several 
junctures Mirabeau had had reason to think he would be 
elected. At the time of the celebration of the Federation 
he had been opposed by the umbrageous virtue of La 
Fayette, who since then had not given him his promised 
support. Mirabeau's address on the civil Constitution 
had weakened his chances, which had materially improved. 
"I don't care a fig," he wrote to the Comte de La Marck 
with scornful familiarity, but, at heart, he had a very 
natural desire for the honour. He was elected on 
January 29, and was an incomparable president. Never 
had the office been so brilliantly filled or exercised with 
such genial ease, such sovereign clarity, or such witty 
impartiality. The speeches he made in answer to the 
delegations admitted to the bar show a marvellous supple- 
ness of mind and form. 

To the composers he delivered an eulogy of music with 
a lightness and quickness of touch which recalled his little 
book, Le Lecteur y mettra le Titre. 

To the municipality of Paris, who protested against the 
special control of the municipal excise, he replied: "Do 
not be afraid of the weight of your trials : it is something 

297 



MIRABEAU 

gained for liberty." He proclaimed the necessity of public 
peace and order and of the union of all citizens. And, 
forgetting the duplicity of the advice he had given in his 
secret plan, he decried the "intriguing men who were 
trying to disturb law and order in order to raise them- 
selves to the position of moderators and mediators." 

To a deputation of the Quinze-Vingts he declared, with 
the emotion of one whose sight has been impaired, 
that the Assembly had every sympathy with "the cruel 
affliction which deprives a man of all the consolations of 
life and yet falls short of death." He added that a blind 
man without a leader ought to be a sight unknown among 
civilized nations. Are there not even now only too many 
highly civilized nations where such a sight is seen ? 

To the Quakers, who asked permission to practise their 
religion in France, and to have their civil status expressed 
in a particular form, he replied in a speech the prudent 
courtesy, the political wisdom and high philosophy of 
which several times provoked the unanimous applause of 
the Assembly. True, in such speeches Mirabea,u was 
exceeding the bounds of his office. But who would think 
of reproaching him when he expressed such ingenious and 
moving thought with such delicacy and force ? The 
Quakers had invoked the article of their religion which 
forbade them to carry arms or to kill under any pretext 
whatever. "It is doubtless," he replied, "a fine philoso- 
phical principle thus to worship humanity ; but consider 
whether self-defence and the defence of kin and kind is 
not also a religious duty." 

To the lawyers he made a magnificent eulogy of public 
and private law, "the eternal truths which, based on the 
nature of man and society, see everything change about 
them and never change themselves, and are the principle 
of every lasting regeneration." 

If it is true that certain of Mirabeau's enemies had raised 
him to the presidency in order to set him aside and reduce 

298 



THE LAST THREE MONTHS 

him to silence, their doing so served their designs but ill. 
His tenure of the office was the public revelation of certain 
qualities of the mighty Tribune which until then had only- 
been appreciated by his intimate friends. His glory 
gained by it. Circumstances, a few days after he had 
surrendered the chair to Duport, were to heighten it still 
more by the heroic resistance which Mirabeau offered to 
the "anarchists," whose excesses were favoured by a section 
of the Assembly, a weakly complacent section, who did 
not share their opinions. 

Mirabeau 's popularity made M. de La Marck uneasy : 
"If ever he were to despair of a government," he wrote, 
"and were to count wholly on his popularity he would 
be insatiable." The part played by Mirabeau in arrang- 
ing for M. de La Marck to go to Metz to warn the Marquis 
de Bouille of the possibility of the King's departure was 
enough to allay such anxiety. This plan, of the circum- 
stances of which little is known, came to nothing. It is 
difficult to say in what form or to what purpose Mirabeau 
would have facilitated its realization. We can only con- 
clude from it that Mirabeau did not abandon his "wards," 
as he called the King and Queen. Never had they been 
in greater need of his guardianship. Unfortunately they 
sought his advice more than they followed it, and, either 
from distrust or from weakness, they refrained, especially 
the King, from their personal share in any action demand- 
ing their initiative. 

Being warned of a journey to Rome planned by the 
King's aunts, Mirabeau at once saw and tried to make the 
Court understand the manifold dangers which false in- 
terpretations and the violence of "factions" could bring 
into being. "If Mesdames were to be brought back," he 
said, "the commotion might extend even to the palace, and 
when one lives under a thatched roof it is reasonable to 
dread both flood and fire." He pledged the King to take 
the initiative in approaching the Assembly to point out, 

299 



MIRABEAU 

that as he dared not, for fear of exceeding his powers, 
forbid a journey which was obviously inopportune, he 
expected the deputies to issue a decree defining his rights 
over the members of his family. Such a step would have 
given Louis XVI the popularity that Mirabeau expected, 
but it was too bold not to be distasteful to the King's 
habitual indecision. Mesdames Adelaide and Victoire left 
Paris for Rome on February 19, and were first stopped at 
Moret, and then detained in the Cote d'Or by the munici- 
pality of Arnay-le-Duc, whose report, together with a protest 
by the King's aunts, claiming their rights as "citizenesses," 
was sent to the Assembly. Mirabeau blamed Mesdames 
for having done an imprudent and impolitic thing in 
leaving Paris at a time when all good citizens should stay 
at their posts near the head of the nation, but he declared 
that, as the journey was not illegal, there was no reason 
to discuss it. "Is there a law? " he said. And when he 
was interrupted with the reply, "There is a law : the safety 
of the people," he answered with admirable presence of 
mind : "The safety of the people does not entail the neces- 
sity for these ladies to sleep three or four extra nights on 
the road." His motion was carried (February 24). 

On the next day, on the occasion of an incident provoked 
by Cazal^s during the course of a debate on the residence 
of public functionaries, he uttered some of the strongest 
words he ever pronounced. He averred that the oath 
pledged to the nation, the law anH the King was indivis- 
ible, and that none of its component parts could be 
separated : "Our oath of fidelity to the King," he declared, 
"is in the Constitution; it is constitutional. It is pro- 
foundly injurious to cast any doubt on our respect for this 
oath. After such an unequivocal declaration, for which 
I am prepared to fight the whole world, being determined 
to fight every kind of faction that may try to undermine 
the principles of the monarchy, under any system what- 
soever, and wherever in the kingdom it may appear " 

300 



THE LAST THREE MONTHS 

(the Left applauded loudly); "after such a declaration, 
which embraces every locality, all times, all systems, all 
persons, all sects, without wasting more time in vain 
recriminations, let us pass on to the question which is the 
order of the day." 

Never had Mirabeau expressed himself with more 
authority. It was the language of a leader conscious of 
his duty and responsibility. "Take care," he said to 
Malouet with brutal frankness, "I am the only man in 
this patriotic horde who could speak thus without a volte- 
face. I have never adopted their fictions, nor their meta- 
physics, nor their useless crimes." Through all the inci- 
dents that came crowding in, ever more passionate, ever 
more numerous from day to day, he saw the fixed line, the 
steadfast barrier which must be maintained if they were to 
be controlled, their consequences directed, their repetition 
averted. In his hostility to the counter-revolutionary 
monarchists and the revolutionary anarchists he regarded 
them both as factions whose success, in either case, would 
lead to tyranny. "It was," as Michelet showed in a com- 
pelling passage, "a solemn field of battle whereon two 
principles, two orders of mind, met in combat : one being 
the original and natural principle which created the Revo- 
lution, justice, equitable humanity — and the other being 
the principle of expediency and interest which called itself 
the public safety." Between the two systems Mirabeau 
was aiming at equity. 

The debate on the journey of Mesdames had only been 
an incident, a preparation for the tragic duel. It was the 
projected decree relating to emigration that brought Mira- 
beau, already mortally stricken, and the Terror, feeling its 
way, to grips. In the name of the committee on the Con- 
stitution Le Chapelier had prepared a project, but, before 
reading it, he declared that it would "be injurious to prin- 
ciples and outside the Constitution." At the same time he 
recognized all the difficulties which would make the applica- 

301 



MIRABEAU 

tion of the ordinary law almost impossible. His honesty 
impelled him to admit the dictatorial nature of what he had 
drawn up. Dictatorial it certainly was, for, in times of 
trouble, the Assembly would be able to give to a council 
of three the right to authorize or forbid passage out of the 
kingdom. 

Mirabeau spoke three times. First of all he read an 
extract from a letter he had written to Frederick William 
of Prussia, on the day of that Prince's accession to the 
throne, in which in the name of eternal equity he denounced 
as tyrannical any law forbidding emigration. When he 
had read this letter he asked the Assembly to pass on to 
the order of the day. The Assembly wished to hear the 
committee's scheme. As soon as its text was made known 
Mirabeau rushed to take possession of the tribune. With 
a firmness of tone which the uproar of a certain thirty 
members of the Assembly could not shake, he opposed the 
discussion of a law which could not be enforced. He 
declared that he would regard himself as released from 
every oath of fidelity to those who should be infamous 
enough to appoint a dictatorial committee. It was a chal- 
lenge. He accentuated the haughtiness of it by the famous 
words which have done more for his glory as an orator 
than all his other eloquent speeches: "The popularity 
which has been my ambition," he cried, "the popularity 
which, like any other man, I have had the honour to enjoy, 
is not a frail reed : I wish that it may plunge its roots into 
the soil down to the unshakable bases of reason and liberty. 
If you pass a law against emigration I swear that I will 
never obey it ! " The muttering gained in volume. Turn- 
ing on the extreme Left from whence the uproar came, he 
silenced them with a sublimely scornful cry: "Silence, 
you thirty ! " His brevity was better than a programme. 
Outside the mob roared. It was suggested that the pro- 
posal for the decree should be sent back to the committee 
for further consideration : "You may add," he said, "that 
from this moment until the end of the adjournment there 

302 



THE LAST TtHREE MONTHS 

shall be no disturbance." Thus he made the "thirty 
voices " responsible for the disorder which had come as 
far as the very doors of the Assembly. As a member of 
some weeks' standing of the directing body of the depart- 
mental administration of Paris, Mirabeau left the tribune 
to go straight to this post, to which his duty called him. 
There he drew up a proclamation which was an echo of the 
speech he had just delivered: "The authors of these dis- 
turbances," he said, "have dishonoured the name of liberty : 
for liberty does not consist in recognizing no authority : it 
consists in obeying only such law as has been constitution- 
ally made." 

In the evening he went to the Jacobin Club. He had 
already encountered storms there. On December 6, during 
a tumultuous meeting, he had called Robespierre to order 
and respect for the law. When he entered on February 28, 
the hall was full. Duport and Lameth, who had been silent 
in the Assembly, were counting on having their revenge 
on Mirabeau in the over-excited, heated club. Mirabeau 
knew or suspected as much. With admirable courage he 
faced the formidable contest, which was made unequal by 
the passions of a partial audience. His arrival created a 
sensation. Indignant shouts arose. Without showing 
any emotion he went to his place and listened and waited. 
Disconcerted by his unexpected appearance, Duport wan- 
dered off into a long speech against La Fayette. At the end 
of it he denounced those men whom he regarded as most 
dangerous to liberty: "They are not far away," he said. 
The anger of the audience, who had only been waiting for 
this signal, broke out. From every side there came loud 
applause. All eyes were turned on Mirabeau, and the 
spectators stood up and shouted and encouraged Duport. 
He told the story of the morning's sitting : he accused 
Mirabeau of being the head of a coalition against the 
Jacobins : he declared that the hopes of the nation and 
of liberty could never rest upon any one man, and then, 
in a movement which in fairness he could not but render to 

303 



MIRABEAU 

Mirabeau as his due for so many services given to their 
cause, he appealed to the Tribune to affect a reconcihation 
in order to defend the pubHc Hberty. 

Mirabeau walked swiftly to the tribune. He was 
received with wild uproar, insults, threats. He stood up 
against them and at last obtained silence. Instead of turn- 
ing on La Fayette and thus diverting the storm on to his 
rival's head, he was noble enough and bold enough to 
defend him and to throw in his lot with him. Then he 
turned to Duport's bitter words : he powerfully maintained 
his opinion against the law on emigration, and he 
loudly reproached his adversaries for not having opposed 
that opinion in the Assembly, if they thought it so 
disastrous to liberty. The audience was moved and be- 
came almost favourable. 

Once more Lameth's speech let loose its fury. Ordin- 
arily a dull and poor speaker, Lameth was stung by hate 
and spite into surpassing himself. He was skilful and 
vehement, eager and treacherous. Mirabeau had spoken 
of the "leaders of opinion." This expression was twisted 
by Lameth into an insult to all other deputies, whose 
jealousy, envy and mediocrity he stirred up with deadly 
fervour. With growing audacity he declared that he was 
not of those who thought it necessary to spare Mirabeau 
in order not to drive him to despair. He did not spare 
him. He dragged forth the mistakes of his youth, his 
contradictions, his intrigues, his weaknesses, and the 
equivocal situation that made him at one and the same time 
the champion of the ideas of Malouet, Cazal^s, and the 
Abb6 Maury. The audience was excited almost to 
delirium. 

Mirabeau bore the brunt of this formidable attack with- 
out a word or a gesture of interruption. When he got up 
to reply his hearers displayed an even more violent in- 
dignation than they had done after Duport's speech. The 
president tried to remove the orator from the tribune and 
to close the meeting. The sight of Mirabeau's "terrible 

304 



THE LAST THREE MONTHS 

head," his indomitable and imperious will, his masterful 
coolness, and possibly also the sort of fascination which 
physical courage can sometimes exercise over an unbridled 
mob, triumphed over the revolting partiality of the meet- 
ing. Were they to be so stupid and cowardly as to stop 
the words on the eloquent lips that in each critical hour had 
spoken the vengeful words which had made or saved the 
Revolution ? The club avoided the shame of such injus- 
tice. Mirabeau was heard. What did he say ? History 
knows not. Camille Desmoulins, who reported Lameth's 
accusation in full, gives only a few lines to Mirabeau's 
defence. He admits that he spoke with "infinite art," and 
does not deny his success. That is saying too little. A 
German, himself a Jacobin, who had no interest in the 
quarrel, though he does not give us the lines followed by 
the great orator's reply, leaves no doubt as to the effect 
he produced. Mirabeau was sublime. Not one of his 
speeches could come up to the boiling, tumultuous impro- 
visation, in which, denounced, insulted and threatened, he 
gripped his adversary, and, shaking from his grasp his 
poisoned weapons, laid him low before an audience that, 
in spite of all its prejudices, was overwhelmed and acknow- 
ledged its defeat by enthusiastic applause. "I will stay 
among you even though you ostracize me," said Mirabeau, 
as he ended his speech. He was spared such ostracism 
by death. After the tragic meeting of the Jacobins he 
had only four weeks to live. 

On March i, addressing the National Assembly on 
behalf of a deputation from Paris, he affirmed the neces- 
sity of assuring the public peace against "perverse and 
factious men," whose proceedings he denounced as danger- 
ous to the Constitution. He reminded the people that, 
having laws and magistrates, they could not take things 
into their own hands. On being admitted to the King's 
presence with the same deputation, he declared that "there 
is no real power save in the union of all the forces of the 
Empire with one common end, no lasting government save 
X 305 



MIRABEAU 

that in which the law in its execution preserves all the 
energy of the general will that created it." In such words 
he was expressing the ideas habitual to his mind. Public 
order appeared to him more and more to be the condition 
and safeguard of liberty. But he was not so well inspired 
in proposing, in favour of twelve hundred poor families, 
a levy of five days' pay on each deputy. Robespierre 
rejected the principle. "Every motion," he said, "tending 
to pervert the salary of the representatives of the nation 
from its proper destination is an abnegation of the pro- 
tective principles of public liberty." Democratic truth 
was on Robespierre's side. 

Of Mirabeau's subsequent interventions it is only neces- 
sary to note one speech, which was deliberately confused, 
on the question of the Regency, and two dissertations on 
the control of mines. This last question, which is arid 
and difficult, was outside his range. He dealt with it to 
oblige his friend M. de La Marck, who was personally 
interested. His two great speeches on this matter, of which 
the Assembly adopted the conclusions, were drafted by his 
collaborator Pellenc. Mirabeau read the first at the sitting 
of March 21, and the second, which he delivered on the 
27th, was the occasion of his last appearance in the tribune. 

He was already ill, and, worn out by this effort, he took 
to his bed, never to rise again. The restlessness of his life, 
his excesses in work and pleasure, had undermined his 
health and he could hold out no longer. Cabanis, whose 
cultured and brilliant mind he loved, was under no illu- 
sion as to the seriousness of his condition : never had he 
seen a sick man so obviously stricken with death. He 
diagnosed his affection as inflammation of the diaphragm. 
The disease took its usual course, every now and then 
giving some hope of a cure, hope to which the patient 
clung more than the physician. The crisis lasted for a 
week. As soon as it was known, and its danger was 
suspected, there was a marked change in public opinion. 

306 



THE LAST THREE MONTHS 

Since his life had been changed by his relations with the 
Court, Mirabeau had lived in a house in the Chauss^e 
d'Antin. His door was besieged by an eager mob hungry 
for news. All sorts and conditions of men met outside. 
Barnave came with a deputation from the Jacobins. But 
no one was admitted to see Mirabeau as long as there was 
any hope of recovery, for he would not run any risk of 
counteracting the doctor's remedies by excessive emotion. 
When the great orator felt that all was over he sent for his 
friends, the Comte de La Marck, Frochot, Pellenc, and his 
sister, Madame du Saillant, and he talked to them inces- 
santly. On the eve of his death he received Talleyrand, 
and gave him a speech on the equal division of inheritance 
in the direct line, which he wished him to read in the tribune. 
His self-possession was stoical. He was interested in all 
the news of affairs at home and abroad, and though he 
could not but know the immense force of which his disap- 
pearance from the scene would rob the country, he accepted 
death with a smiling serenity which showed the fortitude 
of a rare soul. Death came, after frightful sufferings, on 
the morning of April 2. 

The public emotion showed how exceptional was Mira- 
beau's position, and how great a popularity his genius and 
his services had won for him. There was general con- 
sternation. The people who, during his illness, had de- 
manded the closing of all the play-houses, absolutely 
renounced balls and festivities as a provocation and pro- 
fanation. The department of Paris, the municipality, and 
many other departments went into mourning. In the name 
of the department the Due de la Rochefoucauld in the 
Assembly deplored the great public calamity, and de- 
manded that the recently-erected church of Saint Genevieve 
"should be transformed into a burial-place for great men, 
so that the temple of religion should become the temple 
of the country, and the tomb of a great man should become 
the altar of liberty." On a motion by Barnave, which 

307 



MIRABEAU 

does honour to his generosity, the Assembly decided that 
"Mirabeau had deserved the honours which are decreed 
by the nation for the great men who have served it well." 

The obsequies were held on April 4. They were mag- 
nificent. From the Chaussee d'Antin to the Church of 
Saint Eustache and from Saint Eustache to Saint Gene- 
vieve there was an unbroken procession. All the 
authorities, civil and military, took part in it. Three 
hundred thousand men were gathered together. Windows, 
balconies, terraces, walls, trees were crowded with people. 
The rolling of drums and the funeral marches in the 
darkness of the night took on an even more mournful 
character and heightened the sorrow of the people, who 
were throughout quiet and orderly. As the body, borne 
by twelve sergeants of the regiment of which Mirabeau 
was commander, passed through the streets there was a 
mournful silence. The presence of almost the whole 
Assembly joined the homage of France to the sorrow of 
Paris. The most eloquent orator of liberty had a royal 
funeral. His glory overshadowed his faults. 

But the "dreadful secrets" with which Marat sullied and 
threatened his memory, were not buried with him in the 
tomb. The iron chest in the Tuileries, when opened by 
the Convention, gave up the incriminating papers. The 
statue of Mirabeau was veiled. Then, on the motion of 
M. J. Ch^nier, the Assembly, "considering that without 
virtue no man is great," ordered the body of Mirabeau to 
be removed from the French Pantheon. On September 21, 
1794, his remains, contained in a wooden coffin, were laid 
in the "common burial-ground." They have not been 
recovered, and it is doubtful if they ever will be. Mira- 
beau's body is lost, but his memory has ever waxed greater. 
History, though it does not excuse the mighty orator's 
weaknesses, salutes in him, as Gambetta said, "the most 
glorious political genius this country has had since the 
incomparable Cardinal Richelieu." 

308 



CHAPTER XVI 

MIRABEAU AS A STATESMAN 

Programme and method ; respect for traditions and the past — 
Would Mirabeau's plan have succeeded ? — The Court's distrust — 
The first triumph of the Terror. 

After Mirabeau's death his contemporaries estimated, if 
not the whole range of his genius, at least the immensity 
of the loss the country had suffered. Their testimony is 
unanimous: "No one," said the Marquis de Ferrieres, 
"dared wield the sceptre that Mirabeau had relinquished. 
Those who were the most jealous of him seemed the more 
embarrassed. If there were any important questions all 
eyes turned mechanically to the place formerly occupied 
by Mirabeau ; it was as though they were inviting him to 
return to the tribune and waiting, before they formed an 
opinion, for him to enlighten the Assembly." Mme. de 
Stael wrote in a similar strain : "The day after his death, 
no one in the Constituent Assembly could gaze unmoved 
upon the place where Mirabeau used to sit. The giant oak 
had fallen, and there was nothing to distinguish all the 
rest." To such homage from a royalist and the daughter 
of Necker must be added that of Camille Desmoulins. 
After having loved Mirabeau "like a mistress," Desmoulins 
had left him to become the echo of the triumvirate, and had 
subsequently thrown in his lot with Robespierre. "On the 
news of his death," he wrote in the Revolutions de France 
et de Brahant, "there fell a stupefying silence for some 
time on the Assembly. All men were silent before his 
coffin. It was as though they could not believe that the 
torch, which for two years had shed such a powerful 

309 



MIRABEAU 

light in their midst, was put out. Thus it was that the 
people who thronged the street round his house, when they 
knew that half his body was already cold in death, could 
not accustom themselves to the idea that Mirabeau was 
mortal." 

Such emotion was due to the fascinating power which 
Mirabeau 's eloquence had exercised, to the great memories 
from which it was inseparable, to the historic scenes which 
it had animated. But also it was the expression of the 
profound disappointment which so many abortive hopes 
had produced. All parties regretted Mirabeau. The 
dubious side of such unanimity did not escape the malicious 
vivacity of Camille Desmoulins : "Negroes, monarchists, 
eightyninists, Jacobins," he wrote, "all honoured him with 
a funeral oration after their fashion." Had he then flat- 
tered and deceived them all ? Not at all. He belonged to 
the party of the Revolution, but in the Revolution he 
belonged to no party. He had remained faithful to his 
resolve to bow before no idol, to cringe before no power, 
only to take up arms for reason and truth, to have no 
"other judge but Time." Free then from all bond service, 
conscious of his power and confident in it, he yielded only 
to the inspirations of his political conscience, scorning the 
"exchange of opinions and complacent compromise with 
which a statesman has so often to be content." While 
the Ministers, caught napping by the Revolution, having 
neither any general outlook nor directing power, were 
drifting at the mercy of events and parties, Mirabeau had 
a definite purpose, a fixed plan, a reasonable sense of the 
difficulties and their remedies, the end and the means. 
In his plans he had made room for liberty and authority, 
royalty and Revolution. Among those who, "lacking in- 
struction and principles, desired a revolution without 
bounds or tempering," and those who, "having neither 
good faith nor wit, believed or pretended to believe in the 
re-establishment of the old system, he represented a deli- 

310 



MIRABEAU AS A STATESMAN 

berate, considered and definite Revolution, "though with- 
out being envious of time and desiring moderation, grada- 
tions and a hierarchy." 

To such a programme and method he hoped to rally 
the men of good faith who in the beginning had not wished 
for the Revolution, but understood that it was an accom- 
plished fact, and wished to circumscribe it only in order 
to consolidate it. He wished the King, who alone was 
qualified for the position, to be at once the head and the 
moderator of the new system. The existence of a strong 
armed executive power seemed to him to be, not only the 
essential condition of public order, but also the guarantee 
of liberty. To apply the principles declared in 1789, to 
maintain and develop them, to fight in their name against 
despotism and anarchy, he felt that a government was 
needful. It was the corner-stone of the plan he had been 
pondering ever since the convocation of the States-General, 
and the master idea which, since that time, had dominated 
all his speeches and all his actions. Camille Desmoulins 
was not mistaken. Whatever the irritation he felt about 
the discussion on the right of peace and war, he recognized 
that, through all those perilous days, Mirabeau had been 
for the executive power, and that he had always been 
opposed to the curtailment of the ministerial power. "We 
must be just," he added. "This observation is in his 
favour, since it makes his opinion of Miay 22 the conse- 
quence of a logical system." 

This system was a stumbling-block alike to those who, 
as partisans of absolutism, did not understand that the 
royal power could only survive in a moderated and limited 
form, and to those who, through weakness or intrigue, 
desired no bounds to be set to the omnipotence of the 
Assembly. Mirabeau was attached to a middle policy, and 
strove, in spite of every obstacle, to reconcile the royal 
authority and the national liberty. When he defended 
liberty the extreme revolutionaries acclaimed him. When 

311 



MIRABEAU 

he supported authority they accused him of having gone 
over to the adversaries of the Revolution. Camille 
DesmouHns reproached him with his "ubiquity." And, 
indeed, to judge by appearances, Mirabeau seems to have 
been everywhere and nowhere. On his death, each party, 
recollecting only that element of the Tribune's policy 
which sorted with its interests or its passions, laid claim 
to him. But, at heart, Mirabeau belonged to himself 
alone, and had never consented to any partition of himself. 
He did not carry with him to his tomb the secret and the 
riddle of his policy. The policy which he advised the 
Court to adopt in his secret consultations had twenty times 
been publicly expressed. He detested a certain kind of 
finesse, which had always been repulsive to his robust 
nature. "It is possible to go on aping skill, but never 
force." And he was of the race of the strong. 

He preferred the lessons of experience and the reality 
of facts to "philosophic discussions" and "laboured 
doctrines." Unlike Siey^s, he was not a "citizen philo- 
sopher," but a politician and a man, and he declared that 
"it is not always convenient to consult only the right with- 
out taking circumstances into account." The meta- 
physician and the statesman do not proceed along the 
same lines and do not aim at the same goal. The one 
journeys over a chart of the world and is never impeded 
by obstacles. The other marches across the earth, where he 
has constantly to face danger of all kinds. Antecedents 
were of no less account to Mirabeau than principles. He 
had a feeling for tradition, which he tried both at home and 
abroad to bring into line with the new order of things. 
He said that "a people that had grown old amid anti-social 
institutions could not adapt itself to pure philosophical 
principles." Principles are as immutable as eternity, but 
the passage of time opposes to them interests, preten- 
sions, and prejudices of which only ignorance or rashness 
could refuse to admit the existence. Mirabeau never con- 

312 



MIRABEAU AS A STATESMAN 

founded politics with "romance." As a man of action, 
endeavouring to translate his ideal into actuality, he neg- 
lected neither the force of things nor the passions of men. 
The fiery orator was a mighty realist ; nothing but a caprice 
of fate denied the part, in the transition from Richelieu to 
Bonaparte, which was fitting to his genius, that was hardly 
at all inferior to theirs. 

He was conscious of being big enough to face every 
difficulty and to defy Pitt, "to whom he would have given 
much trouble," no less than the anarchists, whose audacity 
he had denounced. What truth there might be in Burke's 
pamphlet did not apply to him. The Constituent 
Assembly had yielded less than is supposed by a certain 
historical school to philosophical abstractions, and the 
practical work it did was immense. But, by proclaiming 
the "Rights of Man " it had offended the national and tradi- 
tional feeling of the English, which was interpreted by 
the bitter irony of Burke : " We have always desired," 
said Burke, "to derive what we possess from the past, as 
an heritage bequeathed to us by our ancestors. We 
demand our franchise not as the rights of man, but as 
the rights of Englishmen. . . . We are determined to 
maintain an Established Church, an established monarchy, 
an established aristocracy, an established democracy, each 
according to its existing degree and no more." These blunt 
affirmations might fairly be opposed to certain theories of 
Rousseau, but Mirabeau had certainly never incurred any 
such reproach. Did he not seem to be answering Burke 
and refuting him in anticipation when he contrasted with 
the "savages of the Orinoco" the government, King and 
prejudices pre-existing in France before the Revolution ? 
In his eyes "abruptness of the transition " was the greatest 
danger. As he wrote to the Bailli, "the period of tt-ansi- 
tion between two revolutions is always worse than the 
position that has been abandoned, however oppressive it 
may have been." Therefore to come successfully through 

313 



MIRABEAU 

such a period he clung to everything that had a "handle " 
and a "hold." "Anything will serve," he declared, 
"events, men, things, opinions." 

And yet he did assign to the past the part which can never 
be refused it without rashness : he wished the new regime 
to be surrounded with sure, faithful men who would under- 
stand and love it. The time for personal favours was 
gone : " It is no longer a matter of giving creatures to the 
Ministers, but of giving Ministers to the King," and by 
the King, Mirabeau meant the Revolution as well as the 
monarch. For diplomatic appointments he demanded 
agents "whose former prejudices would not be inimical to 
their duty," and who "would not compromise the power of 
France by doubts as to her success." Far from disregard- 
ing youth, he pinned his faith to it. When the question 
arose of sending a negotiator to Madrid to alter the Family 
Compact, he did not hesitate to recommend a young man, 
and a new man, to the Court, "for, indeed, it is time to 
form new men and to bind them to us. Now, nothing 
forms youth so much as great affairs, which force it into 
self-restraint, and nothing is so binding, and that is worth 
something, as a great mark of confidence." 

Thus prepared, attended and armed for the fight, what 
would Mirabeau have done? Would his plan have suc- 
ceeded, or did he die at the right moment for his fame ? 
Historians are divided on this question. For my part, I 
have no hesitation in thinking that during the spring of 
1 79 1 events would have brutally and irreparably upset his 
plans. Not that, intrinsically, they were absolutely outside 
practical politics, or that the whole of his contradictory 
and complex scheme was condemned to failure; but, for an 
even partial success, Mirabeau's personal activity, his 
motive force, his constant direction, his continual super- 
vision, were absolutely necessary. Limited as he was to 
the obscure position of secret adviser, he had therefore 
neither the sympathy, nor the esteem, nor the confidence 

314 



MIRABEAU AS A STATESMAN 

of those whom he was advising. As a secret Minister he 
would not have played an ineffective part if his advice had 
been followed. Unfortunately he was consulted but never 
heeded. The evidence of Fersen may be quoted as prov- 
ing this point. Fersen wrote to the King of Sweden : 
"Mirabeau is still paid by the Court and working on its 
behalf ; but he now has not as much scope for doing good as 
he had for doing harm. ... In spite of that it is worth 
while not to have him against us. All he does serves but 
to produce a little order and peace and to assure the safety 
of the royal family, but they will never be of use for any 
other purpose." 

This admission, which is the more valuable because of 
its intimacy, reveals the intentions of the Court. Marie 
Antoinette may at one time have believed that Mirabeau 
was destined to play a different part. She was not in the 
deplorable state of mind with regard to him that is shown in 
her letter of August 26, 1 791, to the Comte de Mercy-Argen- 
teau : " It is impossible to go on living like this : the only 
thing we can do is to bemuse them and give them confidence 
in us, so as to trick them the more effectively later on." 
She did not wish to "trick" Mirabeau. It was to her that 
Mirabeau addressed his memoranda, from her that he 
expected the motive force and the "definite decisions" to 
overcome the King's indecision. But she had neither the 
application nor the power of concentration for any consecu- 
tive thought. As for the King he remained the "inert 
creature" who so distressed M. de La Marck. Far from 
giving Mirabeau his "entire confidence," as he had 
promised La Fayette in writing in April 1790, he regarded 
him as a salaried servant, of whom he used to speak with 
contempt. He turned elsewhere for his real inspiration 
and the advice he followed. He had ended by being con- 
vinced, as Fersen shows, that he would never be King 
"without foreign assistance which would overpower even 
his own supporters." On the eve of Mirabeau's death the 

315 



MIRABEAU 

plan of leaving Paris was settled : it was not the plan which 
Mirabeau had advised. Mirabeau had recommended a 
public departure in the open day, in full confidence in the 
people, to whom the King should appeal "without begging 
for outside support." But "under no circumstances, upon 
no excuse, would he be the confidant or the accomplice in 
anything like an ' escape.' " If such an escape were to be 
attempted, he had declared his determination to "denounce 
the monarch himself." But since he had addressed the 
Comte de Provence in such vigorous terms in the memoran- 
dum of October 15, 1789, though he had not changed his 
opinion, he had, by his treaty with the King, condemned 
himself to silence. After the flight of Louis XVI and 
his arrest at Varennes, how could he have denounced his 
departure without exposing himself to the publication by the 
Court — which, by discrediting him, would hope to discredit 
the Revolution — of the notes he had sent and the sums of 
money he had received? No doubt, by sending, in July 
1790, the manuscripts of these notes to the Comte de La 
Marck so that his friend might defend his memory, 
he flattered himself that he was leaving him "noble 
material for an apology," and such confidence certainly 
shows the loftiness of his intentions. But it is highly 
improbable that the revolutionaries, his companions in the 
fight, being at grips with the resistance and dissimulation 
of the King, would have appreciated such an apology with 
the impartiality of posterity, and in such a case there would 
not have been emptiness in the cry through the streets of the 
capital of "High Treason of the Comte de Mirabeau." 
Deserted and abandoned by the Court, could Mirabeau turn 
against it in the Assembly without making shipwreck on 
the feelings, aggravated and exasperated by certain proof, 
which he had found it so hard to override at the time of the 
first meeting of the States-General ? This time the reproach 
of venality would not have rested on vague indications and 
uncertain presumptions. Would it have been enough for 

316 




DEATH MASK OF MIRABEAU 
{From a C07itei7ip07-ary drawing in the Paul Arbaud collection at Aix) 



MIRABEAU AS A STATESMAN 

Mirabeau to protest, as he had told M'alouet some months 
before, that he had not, by defending the legal and tutelary 
authority of the monarch, deserted the struggle for liberty 
and the fight against tyranny? His huge voice would 
have been powerless to rise above the consequent uproar, 
and his stormy life would have ended, as a pitiful and 
lamentable adventure, in the jealousy of one party, the 
hatred of the other, and the contempt of all. 

Death, which overtook him on April 2, 1791, granted 
him, instead of such a tragic fall, the supreme favour of an 
unforgettable apotheosis, which caused a whole grateful 
and stricken people to bow their heads in grief before his 
bier. Such compensation for the injustice of his fate came, 
alas, too late ! Mirabeau did not leave in the memory of 
men the glory that he had dreamed. Regarding himself 
and wishing to be rather "a statesman than an orator," he 
hated the idea that he had only contributed to a "vast 
demolition." After having taken a larger share than any 
other man, through the brilliance of his pen and the power 
of his speeches, in the abolition of the old order, he was 
filled with the noble ambition to build up the new order on 
the basis of reason, liberty and justice, and had worked 
out the whole plan and drawn up the details of its execu- 
tion in his mind. He felt that the Revolution would only 
be lasting and definite if it could replace what it had 
destroyed, and would consent to apply itself to such a task. 
When he died, it was already too late ! 

Camille Desmoulins distinguishes in Mirabeau, the 
Tribune, whom he admired, and the Consul, whose plans 
he feared. The time for a " Consul " had not yet come. But 
would it ever have come if, in November 1789, Mirabeau 
had been Minister? He lacked his opportunity. Fate 
withheld it from him. If he had been called to the 
Ministry then, not only would his fate have been different, 
but it is not too much to say that the destinies of the 
country would have been changed. What Mirabeau, the 

317 



MIRABEAU 

secret adviser of the Court, could not accomplish at the 
time of his death, Mirabeau, the responsible Minister, 
would have attempted eighteen months earlier, and would 
no doubt have succeeded in doing. By reconciling the 
Monarchy and the Revolution, the authority of the King 
and the liberty of the nation, the principles of 1789 and the 
prerogatives of the executive power; by making "the royal 
power the patrimony of the people," he would have spared 
France the Terror, Csesarism, and invasion. He would have 
advanced by a quarter of a century the definite establish- 
ment of the political conquests of the Revolution. M. 
Jaur^s hails him as "the only man who raises in the mind 
a hypothesis which can for a moment weigh with reality." 
Before M. Jaures, Proudhon had given this hypothesis 
the force of a compelling logic and a moving justification 
which cannot but be accepted by any man who, having 
perceived and understood the genius of Mirabeau, realizes 
the power of his ideas, his tremendous perspicacity, his 
sense of reality, his knowledge of men, and the variety of 
the resources which his supple skill was capable of bring- 
ing to the service of a long-pondered and clear-cut scheme. 
Mirabeau had every quality necessary for playing such a 
game and winning — general culture and familiarity with 
practical affairs, talent and audacity, skill and force, passion 
and self-possession, conviction and courage, and also that 
desire for a personal rehabilitation which accorded well with 
the national reconstruction of which he hoped to be the 
architect. Without making any essential change in the 
general lines of the programme which he subsequently 
offered to the Court, he would have aimed at its realiza- 
tion, by other means more worthy of himself, and, it must 
be said, of the Revolution. The tribune would have taken 
the place of the proposed police. There, in open debate, in 
the conflict of interests and parties, no man, in hours of 
crisis, could withstand him. In November 1789, where 
were the thirty voices that in February 1791 he silenced 

318 



MIRABEAU AS A STATESMAN 

with his superb contempt? And, after his magnificent 
reply during the discussion on the right of peace and war, 
what became of men hke Lameth, who were crushed by a 
scornful allusion to their past as courtiers ? What became of 
Barnave himself, who only the day before had enjoyed a 
triumph ? Lanjuinais was not mistaken when he spoke of 
the influence that Mirabeau as a Minister would have 
exercised over the Assembly. He would have been its 
master. But the gain would have been as great for the 
country as for Mirabeau. The decree of November 7 broke 
the only power which could consolidate the Revolution by 
moderating it. It was on that day really, and not on the 
day of Mirabeau's death, that "the ruins of the monarchy 
became the prey of faction," and Revolution by way of the 
Terror won its first victory over Revolution by way of 
Law. 



319 



CHAPTER XVII 

MIRABEAU AS AN ORATOR 

The problem of collaboration : Reybaz and Dumont — Mirabeau's 
methods of work — The origins of his eloquence — Mirabeau in the 
tribune : his wit, his imagination — Conclusion. 

The Souvenirs sur Mirabeau of Etienne Dumont, pub- 
lished in 1832, made a real impression. The share which 
the author took to himself in the great orator's speeches 
and addresses, and the share which he acknowledged as 
belonging to his Genevese compatriots, were the subject of 
passionate discussions. Jules Janin wrathfuUy denounced 
it as a profanation and a lie. With heated irritation and 
force he condemned such "banal accusations and stupid 
recriminations." Goethe in a conversation with Ecker- 
mann was more cool and just : "Mirabeau," he said, "who 
was a miracle, is becoming a natural human being, but 
the hero loses none of his greatness thereby. He possessed 
the gift of discerning talent, and talent was attracted 
by the dominant quality of his mighty nature and was 
glad to submit to him and his direction. So he was sur- 
rounded with a number of men of remarkable intelligence, 
whom he filled with his fire, and set moving by directing 
them towards the lofty goal at which he aimed. To act 
with others and through others was precisely the quality 
of his genius, his originality and his greatness." 

In these characteristic words Goethe may be said to have 
pronounced a final judgment on the various and numerous 
collaborations which Mirabeau employed in the course of 
his labours. We can only be astonished at the excitement 
caused by Dumont's revelations if we remember that they 

320 



MIRABEAU AS AN ORATOR 

merely stated definitely what had already been written and 
said during the Revolution. Mme. Roland, Mme. de Stael, 
the Marquis de Ferrieres, the Due de Levis and Chateau- 
briand, leave no doubt on' the subject. Immediately 
after the death of the tribune, Camilla Desmoulins wrote 
in his own picturesque fashion : " Every one knows that, 
after the manner of the actors in the Roman theatre, of 
whom there were always two for each part, one for de- 
clamation and the other for gesture, M. de Mirabeau 
always reserved gesture for himself and relied for the 
sound on another person hidden behind the scenes." 
Dumont's Souvenirs had partly raised the back-cloth. 
A book published in 1874 by M. Ph. Plan, under the 
title of Un collaborateur de Miraheau, is full of unpublished 
documents which make it possible to penetrate further 
into the secret of the collaborations on which Mirabeau 
relied. 

A pastor of the reformed Church, a tutor in various 
noble families, and, later, a citizen of Geneva, Reybaz had, 
during his first visit to France, known some of the famous 
men of the time, particularly Voltaire, who appreciated the 
quality of his mind, which was literary, scientific and 
philosophical. Having taken part in the inner struggles 
of his city in the cause of such truth and justice as his 
conscience as an honest man imposed on him, Reybaz 
took refuge in Paris, where he extended the range of his 
culture, which was already wide and profound. Three 
of his compatriots, Clavi^re, Duroveray, and Dumont, who 
had all been working for a more or less considerable time 
for Mirabeau, tried in August or September 1789 to bring 
him into touch with the already famous tribune. Being 
distrustful and a rigid moralist Reybaz declined. Mira- 
beau tried all the more to win him over, and, with 
a respect and formality which were not very usual with 
him, neglected no attention which might attract him and 
procure his alliance. With his usual swift and sure 
Y 321 



/ 



MIRABEAU 

insight he had appreciated the assistance to be derived from 
such a highly developed talent which was equally apt 
with pen and speech. In the month of January 1790 there 
began between him and Reybaz a correspondence and 
relationship which only ended with the death of Mira- 
beau. The oratorical gifts of Reybaz are proved by the 
simple fact that, when in 1794 he was appointed repre- 
sentative of Geneva in Paris, and presented his letters of 
credence to the Convention, he delivered a speech which 
was so successful that the Assembly ordered its translation 
into all languages. With admirable art Mirabeau utilized 
the resources of this superior man. The letters which he 
wrote to him, now in the Library at Geneva with the 
rough drafts prepared by Reybaz, make it possible for us 
to attribute to the Genevese pastor the almost exclusive 
authorship of a speech, which was never delivered, though 
it was almost completed, in favour of the marriage of 
priests, and the entire composition of the speech which 
Talleyrand read after the death of Mirabeau and in accord- 
ance with his wishes, on the equal division of inheritance 
in the direct line. 

But the published documents do not allow us to stop 
there, and Reybaz must be credited with other orations, 
read by Mirabeau in the tribune, which contributed largely 
to his reputation : for instance, the celebrated speech of 
August 27, 1790, on assignats. We can have no room 
for doubt if we follow the correspondence between Mira- 
beau and Reybaz and the indications given by the orator 
to his "factor," and especially if we read this passage 
from a note he wrote to him after the triumphant sitting : 
" I send you all the compliments I have received on the 
excellent speech you gave me." Does that mean that 
Mirabeau had, to adopt Camille Desmoulins' expression, 
only contributed the gesture and delivery ? His letter 
shows that he had added "a few pages and altered a few 
words which should stand in the printed copy." The real 

322 



MIRABEAU AS AN ORATOR 

matter of the speech is therefore certainly due to Reybaz. 
Mirabeau, on the other hand, had no intention of losing 
the advantage of his success, and he wrote to his collabora- 
tor : "N.B. Follow the Moniteurs carefully so that we can 
be ready for a reply." The reply was delivered on Septem- 
ber 27. In the interval Mirabeau was busy stirring up the 
zeal of his collaborator, suggesting ideas, arguments, 
developments, sending him documents and instructions, 
and especially urging on him the importance of justifying 
him against the reproach of self-contradiction, which, not 
inaccurately, had been levelled against him. Although the 
question was not yet in the order of the day, he wrote to 
him on September 10, "Please send me a fair copy as soon 
as possible so that I may be well up in the matter." 

On other occasions Mirabeau would ask for variations, 
which, in the form of marginal notes, would give him 
room to alter the text to fit the moment of his participation 
in the discussion. He did this for a speech, which, how- 
ever, circumstances did not allow him to deliver, in reply 
to Lavenue's proposal to tax incomes. Although Reybaz 
had been working for a whole month on this speech, on 
his behalf and according to his instructions, Mirabeau 
placed himself at the disposal of the Committee, on any day 
at any hour, saying that he was ready. "Or rather that 
he had no need of preparation." Clearly he was not 
lacking in audacity. 

With skilful flattery and delicious cajolery he made 
Reybaz work at every kind of subject : the death penalty 
and criminal reform, public education, the relations of the 
executive power and the administrative power, the organ- 
ization of the National Guard, the law of adoption, and 
of extradition. From all these demands, which prove the 
breadth of his preoccupation and the encyclopaedic power 
of his correspondent, we must insist on the exceptional 
interest which Mirabeau attached to the institution of a 
scheme of national education, "the sheet anchor of the 

323 



MIRABEAU 

Revolution," as he said, "and after the Uberty of the press, 
the only palladium of public liberty." 

All these documents, by establishing the important part 
played by Reybaz in Mirabeau's speeches, have, at the 
same time, strikingly confirmed the assertions, formerly 
so hotly disputed, of Etienne Dumont. A very learned 
man, safe in his judgment, a collaborator of Bentham, 
and a remarkable publicist, Dumont rendered Mirabeau 
services which are beyond dispute. Are all the speeches 
and addresses of which he claims the authorship in his 
Souvenirs to be attributed to him? Many of them, 
and some of the most famous, such as the speech of July 
8, 1789, on the dismissal of the troops, must be; Dumont's 
good faith is undoubted, but the inexactitude of his 
assertions, which has been proven on certain points, shows 
how difficult and even how impossible it is to define 
the precise extent of the collaborations by which Mira- 
beau profited. I will give only one example. In the 
Souvenirs Dumont declares himself to be the author 
of the noble and vivid address which followed the speech 
on the dismissal of the troops, and he provides some 
curious details of the circumstances of the preparation of 
that address. On the other hand, if we open the Histoire 
de I'Assemblee Constituante by Alexandre Lameth, who 
was no friend of Mirabeau, we find the author saying, "As 
a member of the publishing committee, I saw almost the 
whole of this famous address. . . . M. Dumont is to be 
credited with having combined feelings of moderation with 
ideas of convenience. As for the passionate eloquence 
which breathes forth from this truly national allocution, 
that must infallibly be credited to Mirabeau." 

That being so, apart from the few exceptions which 
allow of more exactness, all we can do is to draw up a list 
of the journeymen employed by Mirabeau in what he 
called his "workshop." By the side of Reybaz and 
Dumont a slightly lower place must be made for Duroveray, 

324 



MIRABEAU AS AN ORATOR 

but it is impossible to exaggerate the part played by 
Pellenc : as Mirabeau's secretary, Pellenc was, by his 
varied accomplishments, the chief collaborator of the 
Tribune who used his remarkable intelligence and resources 
in numerous important works. The list is completed by 
various occasional correspondents like the Abb6 Lamou- 
rette in the work relating to the civil Constitution of the 
clergy : the Englishman, Clarkson, for a speech read to 
the Jacobins against the trade in negroes : Clavi^re for 
questions relating to the Caisse d'Escompte; a French 
Consul in the East, Peyssonnel, for certain diplomatic 
business; an adviser to the Cour des Monnaies of Nancy, 
M. Beyerle, for the re-casting of the system of coinage. 

Not all the speeches prepared by these collaborators were 
delivered; many of them were found unpublished among 
Mirabeau's papers They show how right Goethe was in 
praising his special genius for acting with and through 
others. Chamfort said that Mirabeau was the flint with- 
out which he could not fire his gun. This "flint" pos- 
sessed a sovereign magic. When it was broken many 
of the lights it had lit were of no use or account : Mme. 
de Stael very justly observes that after Mirabeau's death 
not one of his friends "could have written what he had 
inspired in them." 

Mirabeau did really inspire his collaborators. He used 
to explain to them, more or less at length, sometimes with a 
general plan, sometimes with detailed ideas, what he 
expected of them. When he asked Reybaz for a reply on 
the subject of assignats, he laid down the "three heads" 
under which that reply was to be arranged. A few days 
later a particular set of circumstances suggested the idea 
of a parallel between the life of the speculator and that of the 
agriculturist, and the necessity for a "paragraph to please 
Paris." He apologized for increasing the task with flatter- 
ing words to which Reybaz could not remain insensible. 
"Oh ! " he said, "who but you could so brilliantly incor- 

325 



MIRABEAU 

porate such an intercalation in your magnificent work ? 
Vale et me ama." When the debate on the Regency 
seemed to him to be becoming dangerous to the monarchy 
and he felt the necessity for intervening, he sent for 
Pellenc, whom he said he had inoculated with his doctrine, 
and he proposed to take him into the country "to bring 
all their forces to bear on it." Through the Comte de La 
Marck he gave him his instructions: "That he should 
most closely and In detail examine the decree and pick 
out everything that was dangerous to public liberty, con- 
sider it from every point of view, take notes only, but 
develop them sufficiently for me to speak from them easily 
and fluently." That last sentence contains a precious 
indication of Mirabeau's oratorical method. He has often 
been denied a certain gift of moving freely in political 
discussions outside his prepared speech. This is clearly 
mistaken, or, if you prefer it, exaggerated. He used often 
to read : and he even complained one day to Reybaz that 
"though his secretary's handwriting was very charming, 
it was a little minute for the tribune." But often he used 
to speak "easily and fluently," either from notes that had 
been prepared for him, or, according to the testimony of 
'Arthur Young, without the help of a single note. In 
dealing with the driest subjects he used to assimilate the 
information supplied him so completely as to be as much 
in possession of his subject as though he had studied it 
himself. The speeches on mines were, as I have said, 
the work of Pellenc, but no objection caught Mirabeau 
unready, and he replied with marvellous exactness to every 
question put to him during the debate. 

On the other hand he used to reshape most carefully 
the speeches of which he had suggested the general lines 
and the essential details. Being very scrupulous in 
diction, he used to cut and chisel the sentences : he excelled 
in giving the vivacity of his oratorical charm to the rather 
dogmatic dissertations of his Genevese friends who were 

326 



MIRABEAU AS AN ORATOR 

too faithful to their old habit of preaching. Having a 
musical ear he knew the value of words : he was not 
ignorant of the fact that sometimes it only needed the 
transposition of a few words to transform a sentence and 
give it harmony and rhythm. Did he not apologize to 
Reybaz for a " bien which he omitted in delivery " ? Some- 
times, it is true, he made changes of a different kind. He 
would interpolate developments and new ideas. He used 
to impress his originality and his mark on the impersonal 
work of others. What Dumont says of his method as a 
writer is equally true of his method as an orator. "When 
he had his basis and his materials, he used to prune, and 
compress, and give the whole more force and life, and 
impress on it the moving quality of his eloquence. He 
used to call this putting the polish on a piece of work. This 
polish would be an odd expression, an image, a sally, 
an epigram, a stroke of irony, an allusion, some vivid, 
striking phrase which he thought absolutely necessary to 
sustain attention." 

In this way Mirabeau made the work of others his own. 
But without his collaborators he could not have proved 
equal to the overwhelming task imposed on him by his 
reputation. In the new world being constructed day by 
day by the Constituent Assembly, all kinds of questions 
cropped up. Mirabeau was never at a loss, never in- 
different to any of them. Every debate attracted him. No 
other orator possessed so wide a range of competence or so 
great an authority. Even those who were prevented from 
respecting him by his past, his actual life, and their own 
invincible prejudices, could not refuse to acknowledge his 
almost universal competence, his clear-sightedness, his 
good sense, which was as courageous as it was luminous. 
The remark he made about Siey^s : " His silence is a public 
calamity," was more true of himself than of the theorizing 
Abb^, whose power of action was exhausted in a few 
happy and decisive formulae. In that Assembly which had 

327 



MIRABEAU 

barred his access to the Ministry, the need of his words, 
his directions, his advice, was constantly felt. How could 
Mirabeau have avoided it? And how could he alone have 
coped with the necessities of the most copious and fluid 
mass of business that ever weighed upon a legislative 
body ? He was always, to use his own picturesque expres- 
sion, "on the tripod." He also said : "We are altogether 
deprived of time to think and ponder : it has become 
almost impossible for us to organize any big piece of work, 
even when we have all the materials ready." Add to all 
this his vast personal correspondence, the notes he drafted 
for the Court and the time devoted to his pleasures, and 
there need be no surprise that he should have called in the 
aid of collaborators. They were absolutely necessary to 
him. He never repudiated them. And those whom he em- 
ployed were proud to contribute to his glory. It seemed to 
them, as Dumont said, that they were introducing their 
obscure children into an illustrious family. And some^ 
times they were hard put to it to recognize these children. 
In this respect the famous phrase of Cicero has often been 
quoted : "When Sulpicius has to speak on the art of war, 
he has to call in the help of the science of Marius ; but when 
he hears him speak, Marius will be tempted to think that 
Sulpicius knows more of war than himself." Mirabeau 
needed many a Marius. But Clavi^re and Reybaz ad- 
mired him when he spoke on finance, and Dumont when 
he argued on public law, Lamourette when he quoted the 
Oecumenical Councils, Pellenc when he held forth on 
mines. All of them admitted his superiority in the special 
subjects in which they had instructed him. When he had 
^ "thoroughly learned the matter" they had prepared, he 
showed himself their master. But above all they hailed 
in him a real force and spontaneity of genius which never 
belonged to Sulpicius. 

It was when he owed nothing to anybody that Mirabeau 
rose above himself and was really incomparable. His 

328 



MIRABEAU AS AN ORATOR 

improvisations, in which he poured all the ardour of his 
fiery soul, flung down torrents of flame into the Assembly. 
Then he would put his whole soul into his words, and 
become tumultuous, vibrant and pathetic, scornful and 
menacing, impetuous and ironical, without ever losing his 
self-possession amid the passions he let loose, and roused 
or appeased at his will. He would overpower his hearers, 
overwhelm their rancour, reduce to silence all impatient 
jealousy and rival ambitions. All were subjugated and 
spellbound. According to Barnave, no man of his time 
could approach him, and no orator, ancient or modern, has 
ever surpassed the force and beauty of his talent. 

Whence came the talent and how was it formed ? The 
Marquis de Mirabeau said that all his family inherited from 
the Glandeves "a certain exuberance of nature." From the 
time when he was ten years old the boy Gabriel revealed 
his descent by a habit of "speechifying," which his father 
describes. At nineteen the Marquis used to reprove his 
son for his lies, but he used to add that they were almost 
"convincing in their eloquent impudence." At Saintes his 
personal charm and the power of his words had, in spite 
of scandal, "divided the town and the province between 
him and reason." At twenty-two Mirabeau disconcerted 
his uncle with his "head stuffed full of lofty thoughts, 
ardour, fortitude and glory. . . . When he really takes 
up a thing," said the Bailli, "he bends down his head 
and looks at nothing else. ... If he can only be got to 
talk sense, Cicero will be a fool to him." At Pierre- 
Buffiere, where he founded the Conseil des prud'hommes, 
Mirabeau revealed a "suppleness, a roundness and an 
activity " which astonished his father. Eight years later 
the Marquis spurned his son's "horrible talent" and his 
"skill in finding the means to carry conviction." The 
tragic plaint which came from the Keep of Vincennes did 
not move him : he said of the prisoner that "pathos came 
as natural to him as coursing to a greyhound." With the 

329 



MIRABEAU 

acuteness of hatred he discovered all that was reminiscent 
and borrowed in his talent, while its originality escaped 
him. 

It was at Vincennes, during his forty months of im- 
prisonment and solitude, that Mirabeau, protected from 
despair by work, shaped his genius. Not only did his 
intellectual voracity absorb everything, but the writer 
prepared the way, for the tribune. Sainte-Beuve was 
almost the first to remark that the Letters written from 
Vincennes are filled with the "involuntary movements, 
exclamations, and gestures of the orator." Suddenly ceas- 
ing to address Sophie, Mirabeau appeals to an ideal audi- 
ence, which he calls to witness and judge his misfortunes 
and his ideas. "In vain is the orator caged: he rises, 
strides about, and his silent cell reverberates with his 
eloquence." I have tried elsewhere to reveal the force and 
varied eloquence which Mirabeau displayed in the memo- 
randa addressed to his father, to M. de Maurepas and 
M. Lenoir. They are wonderful passages of oratory, com- 
posed as pleadings, to be spoken, ranging from bitter, 
biting irony to the most mournfully pathetic tone. On 
the approach of his liberation Mirabeau wrote to his uncle, 
on December 25, 1779, a curious, breathlessly eloquent 
letter in which he declares his contempt for the greater 
number of positive laws, and, without denying his mistakes 
and misdeeds, tried to explain them. He had won his 
father's forgiveness, but he will not, he says, "plead with 
gratitude," and, addressing the Bailli, he adds: "That is 
practically how I should venture to defend my case before 
your tribunal." And it is in fact to a tribunal with 
open doors and crowded with people that he seems to 
address himself. His voice is heard, he is no longer writ- 
ing, he pleads, speaks, attacks : " If those who accuse me 
were of good faith they would not oppose my using every 
means for a legitimate defence : they would not have had 
me condemned to the silence of the dead, who, at least, are 
not persecuted : they would not have concealed my very 

330 



MIRABEAU AS AN ORATOR 

existence and all knowledge of my fate from the whole 
world : in a word, they would not have had so much 
temerity, suspicion and fear, if they had not been ashamed 
of the part they have played. Let my enemies appear 
openly, and not attack me from the shelter of their 
offices ! Have the laws no force in my country ? Is the 
sovereign no longer our guardian and protector ? Are not 
the magistrates adequate to condemn or absolve me ? . . ." 
His letter of defence continues in this strain, vehement and 
precise, bold, urgent and proud. It is the forerunner of 
the vigorous memoranda produced before the tribunal of 
Pontarlier and prepares the way for the admirable speeches 
which were to move and astonish the Court at Aix. 

As the result of that famous case the orator stood 
revealed to himself and was impressed upon the minds of 
others. Unconsciously he went on preparing himself, dis- 
ciplining his talent, by a constant gymnastic, for the part 
that destiny held in store for him. As a publicist and 
pamphleteer he produced innumerable addresses, denuncia- 
tions, brochures, replies. He became the advocate of the 
financiers or their opponents, he defended the ijews and 
the Batavians : he accused one set of men, protected 
another, was everywhere : his father admitted that there 
was "character even in his impudence," and that he had 
"learned how to use words as an instrument." After the 
letter to the Dutch refugees, he admitted that Mirabeau 
had made himself "a strong and very powerful political 
tribunal." During the campaign in Provence, the inci- 
dents of which he followed with interest, he spoke of the 
"miraculous orator," ironically, no doubt, but suddenly 
he seemed to have a prevision of the immortal sitting 
which would plunge his son into the fight and glory : 
"He will do things which will imply the immunity of 
the States-General : in that case he will be a very great 
personage." 

His apostrophe of Dreux-Br^z6 made Mirabeau a per- 
sonage. It created the Mirabeau legend. It seems im- 

33^ 



MIRABEAU 

possible to imagine him otherwise than with his leonine 
head thrown back, his arm stretched out in defiance and 
menace, with his voice imperiously resounding, driving 
back before the will of the people the monarchy, already 
conquered by the boldness of triumphant right. Indeed, 
the legend, as so often happens, only differs from historical 
fact in degree. In this case it is not so much a deforma- 
tion as an accretion. Mirabeau's physical equipment was 
a part of his eloquence. The orator astonished and domin- 
ated the audience even before he spoke. He would stride 
swiftly to the tribune. Of Herculean build, broad-shoul- 
dered, his massive head crowned with a thick mass of hair 
which was always carefully arranged, Miirabeau gave an 
immediate impression of power. His face, pitted with 
small-pox, was ugly, but his very ugliness, transformed by 
the play of his countenance, was marvellously turned into a 
source of power. When he shook his " terrible boar's head " 
he was terrifying, and no man dared to interrupt him. His 
eyes, in which Chateaubriand saw pride, vice and genius, 
darted lightnings. But when he "softened" them in a 
certain way they had an irresistible fascination. His voice, 
which was musical and tuneful, was a no less compelling 
instrument. He could modulate it with infinite skill, now 
sweet and caressing, now bursting forth like thunder which 
in its furious peal shook the Assembly. Except for a few 
flashing outbreaks, his opening was generally painful, 
awkward, embarrassed. He seemed to hesitate with his 
words like a man trying to bear a burden too heavy for 
him. Even in action his delivery was noble and imposing 
in spite of his passionate intonation. He used to articu- 
late so clearly that nothing was lost, and every sound could 
be heard, even in the farthest corner of that vast assembly. 
At the outset of his career it was felt that his declama- 
tion was a little emphatic, and savoured too much of the 
actor's art. But his charm soon made itself felt and 
carried all before it. His hearers were delighted that he 

332 



MIRABEAU AS AN ORATOR 

spoke and read so well. No one, not even Talleyrand, 
who was a marvellous speaker, could approach him, 
and the speech on inheritance, with which Mirabeau 
had won a great success with the Jacobins, was quite a 
different thing when read by the Bishop of Autun. Mira- 
beau was animated in gesture, but he never made the 
tribune seem a cage from which he was struggling to break 
free. He was solemn rather than excited. His self- 
possession was amazing. When he read his speech on 
the denomination of the Communes, he was speaking 
almost for the first time, but he had complete control of 
himself : insults, imprecations, threats were hurled at him : 
he was quite impassive. As he left the tribune he turned 
to the President and solemnly declared : " I submit to your 
office the fragment which has excited so much protest and 
has been so misunderstood. I am willing that its contents 
should be judged by all the friends of liberty." During the 
debate on the disturbances at Marseilles, the Right inter- 
rupted his speech with cries of slanderer, liar, scoundrel, 
assassin. He stopped for a moment and looked at the 
excited members who were bespattering him with their vile 
words: "I am waiting, gentlemen," he said, "for these 
amenities to die down." Then he went on with his speech 
at the point where he had broken off. 

He was less apt in the cut and thrust of the tribune than 
Barnave, whose facility in improvisation of general ideas 
and dialectical capacity he lacked. His method of work 
and the manifold nature of the questions he embraced pre- 
cluded any prolonged reflection or any profound know- 
ledge of the details of his subject. If he were called upon 
for an immediate refutation, he was liable to be caught 
unprepared. "I see," he said to Dumont, "that if I am to 
improvise a speech on a question I must first of all know 
it thoroughly." He did not always know his subject. 
The Abb6 Maury discovered this weakness and on several 
occasions twitted him on it with exasperating malignity. 

333 



v^ 



MIRABEAU 

Mirabeau therefore detested him, while he respected the 
serious uprightness of Cazal^s. But it was as well not 
to provoke the Tribune too far, for a terrible retort might 
make up for the failure of an argument. Barnave himself 
had a cruel experience of this. In discussing a proposal of 
Mirabeau 's relating to the graduation of employment, he 
made so bold as to rally him on the subject of the suggested 
delay of ten years in preparing for its introduction. Mira- 
beau was infuriated, and cried: "The last speaker seems 
to forget that, if rhetoricians speak for twenty-four hours, 
legislators speak for all time." 

In any discussion he was extraordinarily ready in seiz- 
ing on the weak point of his opponent's argument and he 
was equally swift and clear in discovering the Assembly's 
state of mind. In him the power of the orator was allied 
with the skill of the tactician. He knew how to yield at 
the right moment, or how, with a well-chosen phrase, to 
end a debate and polish off his adversary with a dexterous 
stroke. 

He would gather up the reflections or allusions he heard 
and make them his own by endowing them with a brilliance 
and force that transformed them. In a reply to Barnave, 
he began his speech with a piquant attack : " I have long 
maintained that facility is one of the fairest gifts of nature, 
but only on condition that it be not abused : what I have 
just heard has not led me to change my opinion." He had 
never maintained anything of the kind, but in his exordium 
he employed a phrase of Chamfort's, with whom he had 
just been talking. The magnificent simile of the Capitol 
and the Tarpeian Rock, with which he thrilled the 
Assembly, was suggested to him by a saying of Volney's 
or Rivarol's, which he happened to hear as he was mount- 
ing the tribune: "Well, Mirabeau! yesterday at the 
Capitol, to-day on the Tarpeian Rock ! " There was 
nothing, not even " Silence, you thirty ! " that was not 
inspired by reflections made by others before him. 

334 



MIRABEAU AS AN O.RATOR 

D 'Andre when President had answered a too urgent de- 
mand of Charles Lameth's with : "I cannot, sir, subject the 
Assembly, to the power of thirty of its members." Out of 
this courteous, gently spoken observation Mirabeau had 
fashioned a sublime and tragic cry, the imperious brutality 
of which contained a whole policy and was worth a whole 
speech. 

He was vehement in his indignation, but he also had 
wit of every kind. He answered d'Epresmenil, who in- 
sisted on invoking the Salic law : " I too demand the right 
to speak on the Salic law, and I promise not even to ask 
to have it laid before me." Once, when he was interrupted 
by a voice saying: "You are nothing but a windbag," 
he turned to the President : " Monsieur le President, I ask 
you to suppress the interrupter who called me a windbag." 
In repudiating any share in the disturbances of October, he 
tempered the bitter eloquence of his ardent and magnifi- 
cent speech with good humour. He had been accused of 
making his way through the ranks of the Flanders regi- 
ment, sabre in hand. He had been confused with M. 
Gamaches : "So, when all is weighed and examined," he 
said, "M. Valfond's deposition contains nothing serious, 
except for M. Gamaches, who is legally and vehemently 
suspected of being very ugly, since he is like myself." 
M. Virieux had boasted of having received certain com- 
promising admissions from him : "M. Virieux is a strange 
man ! Did he ever show himself to be so sincere a friend 
of the existing Constitution, that a man who has been 
accused of everything, except stupidity, should have chosen 
him as his confidant?" During the debate on the eccle- 
siastical oath, when he spoke of the spiritual aspect, the 
Right muttered protest : " I beg that part of the Assembly 
which is interrupting me," he said, "to observe that I have 
no designs on a Bishopric." After a speech by the Abb6 
Maury : " I have had some difficulty in guessing whether 
the last speaker ascended the tribune for his own or for our 

335 



MIRABEAU 

pleasure." When the question of the Regency was being 
discussed and it seemed as though the oath of loyaUy to 
the Constitution would be imposed on the future regent, 
M. de Montlosier observed that particular circumstances, 
such as a journey across the seas, might prevent its being 
taken : "I am afraid the last speaker is mistaken," observed 
Mirabeau, "he spoke of a journey across the seas; perhaps 
he meant to say a journey across the Rhine." This allu- 
sion to the emigration had the success it deserved. 

These are aspects of Mirabeau's eloquence which must 
not be neglected, but his genius as an orator lay elsewhere, 
it consisted in power rather than finesse, in passion rather 
than in wit. He was essentially vehement, and did not 
always avoid declamation. Miirabeau had no creative 
imagination. His speeches do not contain the compari- 
sons and contrasts, so striking in their novelty, which 
make Bossuet a great poet. The images he used were 
commonplace. He compares bankruptcy to a gulf or an 
abyss, and where he reaches beauty he does so through 
movement and action and not through imagery. 

On the other hand he was gifted with what we may call 
historical imagination. He excelled in resuscitating the 
facts of the past and flinging them, tingling with life, 
into the debate to enlighten it, impassion it, or hasten its 
end. To the nobility of Provence, who expelled him from 
their midst, he opposed the vengeful memory of Marius. 
To the delegation sent to procure from the King the dis- 
missal of the troops, he recalled the generous and subtle 
kindness of Henry IV who, when he was besieging Paris, 
allowed provisions to be carried into the city. When 
Louis XVI hesitated about giving his support to the 
Declaration of the Rights of Man proclaimed by the 
Assembly, Mirabeau, in order to reconcile his twofold 
respect for the national sovereignty and the royal authority, 
conveyed a warning in a historical reminiscence : " It seems 
to me," he declared, "that the King might be addressed 



MIRABEAU AS AN ORATOR 

with the frankness and truth which a fool of PhiHp's 
expressed in these trivial words, ' What would you do, 
Philip, if everybody said No when you said Yes ? ' " 
When Maury made a rash attack on the rights of the 
Assembly, Mirabeau, quoting with singular felicity the 
famous saying of Cicero, praised it for having saved the 
Commonwealth . 

And never did he more forcibly and more happily 
use this power of reminiscence than in the debate 
raised by the unforeseen motion of Dom Gerle. The 
Jacobin Carthusian, in a sudden and rash inspiration, had 
demanded that the Catholic religion should be proclaimed 
the national religion. Violent passions were let loose, 
which could not be tamed even by a declaration from 
La Rochefoucauld, who invited the Assembly not to debate 
the motion but to proclaim its attachment to the Catholic 
faith, which it had made a first charge on the public funds. 
There was tremendous confusion and tumult, which was 
suddenly ended by Mirabeau. A deputy reminded the 
Assembly that Louis XIV at Cambrai had promised 
never to tolerate the Protestant faith in that town, and 
he demanded that the promise should be carried out. 
Mirabeau rose to protest against "such an act of despotism, 
which could not be taken as a precedent for the representa- 
tives of a free people." Then in superb tones he went on : 
"Since we have admitted historical quotations in relation to 
the matter before us, I will give you one. You will 
remember, gentlemen, that from here, from the tribune 
where I am speaking, I can see the windows of the palace 
where factious men, combining their own temporal interests 
with the most sacred interests of religion, caused the feeble 
hand of a King of the French to discharge the fatal arque- 
bus which gave the signal for the massacre of Saint Bar- 
tholomew." Stupefied and appalled, a profound silence 
descended on the Assembly, then applause and acclama- 
tion greeted the still quivering Mirabeau. It was one of 
2 337 



MIRABEAU 

his greatest triumphs. A few days later when Roederer 
congratulated him and observed that he had been guilty 
of exaggeration, since he could not possibly see the Louvre 
from the tribune, Mirabeau replied, "Now I come to think 
of it, that is so. But in that moment of inspiration I saw 
what I said I saw." Nothing more clearly than this reply 
reveals the force and spontaneity of his genius as an orator. 
One day he said to Barnave : "There is no divinity in 
you." He himself was the equal of the greatest, because 
the divinity had visited and inspired him. 

He loved life passionately and exhausted all its delights ; 
but also, not so much from pride and from nobility of soul, 
he worshipped his fame, which he entrusted to the future. 
He was content to wait for his rehabilitation at the hands 
of time, "that incorruptible judge who grants justice to 
all," and of impartial history. The scandals of his 
youth, and the failings of his maturity had forbidden 
his giving the full measure of his power. He suffered 
from his impotence as from a wrong done to the national 
interests. "Oh! " he said to Cabanis, "if I had brought 
to the Revolution a reputation equal to that of Males- 
herbes ! What a mighty destiny I would have assured for 
my country ! What glory I should have attached to my 
name ! " He was not mistaken in his presentiment. He 
left a great name, which is lit up with a legendary glamour, 
but his destiny was inferior to his genius. 



338 



INDEX 



Abbaye, the, first meeting of the 

Assembly at, 213 
"Academy," Paris, 10 
Addresse aux Bataves, Mirabeau, 

166, 193, 194 
Adelaide, Mme., journey to Rome, 

299-301 
Agriculture, Ministry of, 14 
Aigueperse, Chateau d', 13, 32 
Aix, house of M. de Marignane at, 

38, 40, 42, 48 ; the election at, 

152-160; the trial at, 252-53, 

331 

Albertas, M. d', 37 

Alembert, d', 16 

AUegre, M. d', 50 

Alsace, Mirabeau and, 144-45 ; the 
German Princes in, question of 
indemnity, 262 

Amelot, M., 80 

American War against France, the, 
263 

A^ni des Homntes, L\ Marquis de 
Mirabeau, 3, 14-18, 34, ^tJ, 38 

Amsterdam, Mirabeau in, 53, 66, 
80 

Analyse des papiers anglais, 139 

Andre, M. d', 258, 287, 335 

Antoinette, Marie, affair of the 
necklace, 119, 120, 241 ; and 
the Due d'Orleans, 204 ; and La 
Fayette, 206 ; and Mirabeau, 
208, 209, 222, 234, 277, 278, 284- 
5, 297, 299, 315 ; and Monsieur, 
212; and M. de La Marck, 226, 
233 ; and M. de Fontanges, 239 ; 
letters to M. de Mercy, 239, 275, 
315 ; on the King's character, 
239-40 ; the interview with Mira- 



beau at St. Cloud, 252-54 ; and 
M. de Montmorin, 281 ; and the 
Right 289 

Antraigues, d', 171 

Aragon, Mme. d', 213 

Argenson, d', 14 

Argenteuil, 146-47 

Army, the, the troops and the 
National Assembly, 186-88; 
banquet of the bodyguard, 208- 
9 ; Mirabeau's views on Army 
reform, 254, 261 

Arnay-le-Duc, municipahty of, 300 

Arrighetti family, the, 3 

Artois, Comte d', 220 

Assembly, National, Mirabeau's 
first ideas of a, 125 ; name given 
to States-General by Mirabeau, 
140-41 ; development from the 
Tiers, 180-82 

Assembly of Notables, Mirabeau 
and the, 124-27, 133 

Assembly, The, recall of the troops, 
185-88 ; and the dismissal of 
Ministers, 188 : decrees of August 
4th, 191 ; the Declaration of the 
Rights of Man, 192-95, 313 ; 
motion of M. de Volney for dis- 
solution of, 198 ; the finance 
debate, Mirabeau's speech, 198- 
203 ; measures affecting the 
King's liberty, 209 ; and Louis 
XVI, Mirabeau's proposals, 210- 
12 ; meeting at the Abbaye, 213 ; 
Mirabeau's speech on the finance 
question, Nov. 6th, 217-18; suc- 
cess of the cabal against Mira- 
beau, 218-20 ; the decree of Nov. 
7th, 1789, 225-6 ; sitting of Jan. 



339 



INDEX 



9th, 1790, 226; dispersal de- 
manded by the Right, 227-28; 
attitude of the Right against 
Mirabeau, 228-29 ; visit of the 
King, 230 ; debate on the King's 
right to make war and peace, 242- 
49 ; the diplomatic committee, 
258-59 ; Mirabeau's foreign 
policy, 261-64 ; debate on the 
National Flag, 273-74 ; Mira- 
beau's plans for reform of the 
Constitution by discrediting the 
Assembly, 285-91 ; the Civil 
Constitution of the Clergy, 292- 
95 ; Mirabeau elected Presi- 
dent of, 297-99 ; the law relating 
to emigration, 302 ; news of 
Mirabeau's death, 307-8 
Assignats, question of the, 264-67 
Aulan, Bailli d', and Mirabeau, 

30 
Autun, Bishop of, 287 
Avignon, 262 
Avis aux Hessois, 65 

Bailli, the. See Riqueti 

Bailly, M., 213-14; 221 

Balme, Chateau de, 61 

Barbier de Seville, 115. 

Barnave, policy, 236 ; reply to 

Mirabeau's speech, 245-48 ; on 

the diplomatic committee, 258 ; 

motion of, 294 ; and Mirabeau's 

death, 307-8 
Bastille, storming of the, 73, 187, 

189, 263 
Bayreuth, Margravine of, 7 
Beaufort, Due de, 71 
Beaumarchais, Mirabeau and, 115- 

16, 117, 157 
Belfort, 276 

Belle-Isle, Marshal de, 9 
Bentham, 324 
Berlin, Mirabeau in, 118-119, 121- 

Berri cavalry regiment at Saintes, 
Mirabeau attached to, 29-30 

Berthier, assassination, 188 

Besan^on, Home of Refuge at, 69 ; 
Parlement of, 96 

Beyerl6, M., 325 



Bignon, Le, home of Mirabeau, 12, 

18-19, 27, 35, 46 
Birons, M. des, 95 
Blacas, Due de, 222 
Bhn, deputy, 219 
Bonaparte, Napoleon, Consulate 

of, 290, 313 
Boncheis, 108 
Bonnay, M. de, Mirabeau's plans 

for, 287 
Bonnets carrh, the, 141 
Bordeaux, Parlement of, 226 
Bossuet, 336 
Boucher, Mirabeau and, 71-72, 89, 

91 

Bouilld, Marquis de, 299 

Bourguet, M. de, 52 

Brabant, 204 

Bremont-Julien, request to Mira- 
beau, 158 

Brest, meeting at, 273 

Breteuil, Baron de 113, 128 

Bretons, the, Mirabeau's reference 
to, 226 

Br^ze, M. de, 185 

Brian9on, Co-Seigneur de, 44, 61 

Brienne, Lomenie de. Archbishop 
of Toulouse, and Mirabeau, 130, 
134, 135, 136, 261, 274 ; convoca- 
tion of the States-General, 139 ; 
"the frenzied Archbishop," 163 

Brissot, M., and the Lettres de 
cachet, 78 ; collaboration with 
Mirabeau, iii, 114, 139 

Brittany, resistance to the Civil 
Constitution of the Clergy, 293 

Broglie, Marechal de, 35 

Brugui^res, De, and Mirabeau, 69- 
70, 72 

Brunswick, Duke of, 120, 122 

Bruy^re, La, 1 1 

Buffon, 16 ; principles, 167 

Buoulx, Seigneur de. See Ponteves 

Burke, Edmund, reflections on the 
French Revolution, in, 261, 
263, 313 

Cabanis, Mirabeau and, 306, 338 
Cabris, Madame de, and Mirabeau, 
33, 44, 45, 60-63, 67-68, 73 ; cor- 
respondence with Mirabeau, 36, 50 



340 



INDEX 



Cabris, Marquis de, 20 
Cagliostro, 119 

Caisse d'Escompte, 325 ; adminis- 
tration of the, 129 ; abuses of 

the, 217 
Caisse d'Escompte^ The, Mirabeau, 

114, 126 
Calonne, and Mirabeau, 1 14-17, 

121, 128-30, 146, 266 ; the 

Assembly of Notables, 124-25 ; 

dismissal, 133 
Campan, Madame, 254 
" Capitol and the Tarpeian Rock," 

Mirabeau's simile, 334 
Caraman, M. de, and Mirabeau, 

158-60 
Carignans, the, 35 
Cassano, battle of, 5 
Castagny, Abbe, 31, 36 
Castellane, Mile. Frangoise de, 6 
Castries, M. de, 277 
Catechisme Econoinique, 31 
Catholic religion, Mirabeau and 

the, 165 ; as the national religion, 

debate on the, 337 
Cato, saying of the Marquis de 

Mirabeau regarding, 19 
Caumont, Marquis de, yj 
Cazal^s, M. de, 227, 273, 287, 295, 

300, 304, 334 
Cazaux, M. de, Simpliciti de I'tde'e 

d'une Constitution, 197 
Cerutti, 150, 173,266 
Chabrillant, Vicomte de, 'yj 
Chamfort, collaboration with Mira- 
beau, 112, 325, 334 
Chapelier, Le, 178, 192, 244, 287, 

301-2 
Chateaubriand on Mirabeau, 149, 

321, 332 
Chenier, M. J., motion of, 308 
Choquard, Abbe, 29, 1 1 1 
Cice, M. de, 208, 213, 216, 272 
Cicero, phrase of, quoted, 328 
Ciucinnatus, Order of, 110-12 
" Citizen militia" of Marseilles, 159 
Clarkson, 325 
Clavi^re, Mirabeau and, 97, 112, 

113, 114, 139, 194, 321, 325, 328 
Clergy, the States-General and the, 

178, 180; Mirabeau and the. 



191-92; Civil constitution of the, 
292-95 

Clermont-Tonnere, Comte de, 191, 
218, 287, 288 

Commune, the, speech of the 
Comte de Provence, 221-22 

Compte rendu de Necker, 1 1 3 

Conde, Prince de, 35, 71 

Conseil des prud^hommes, 34, 329 

Considerations on the Order of Cin- 
cinnatus, Mirabeau, 1 10-12 

Constantinople, the embassy, 232 

Constitution, bases of the, Mira- 
beau's opinion on the, 270-71, 
283 ; reform of the, Mirabeau's 
views regarding, 285-91 

Constitutional Club, the, 171 

Conti, Prince de, 71 

Convention, the, 228 ; and Mira- 
beau's papers, 308 ; and the 
speech of Reybaz, 32'i-22 

Correspondance Secrlte, publication, 
149-51 

Corsica, expedition to, 30 

Cote d'Or, 300 

Cour pleni^re, constitution, 142 

Courrier d Europe, 1 1 1 

Courrier de Provence, 218, 230-31 

Courvi^re, Madame de, name 
adopted by Madame de Monnier, 

7° 
Court, the, Mirabeau's relations 

with. See Louis XVI 

Dauphin, the, 297 

Dauphine, estate acquired by Mira- 
beau in, 147 ; states of, 157 

Dauvers, Mile. Julie, 88, 91 

Declaration of the Rights of Man, 
313 ; attitude of Mirabeau, 192- 
95 » 255 ; the king's sanction 
adjourned, 208 

Denonciation de V Agiotage, The, 
Mirabeau, 126-29, 133, 142, 

Desmoulins, Camille, on Mirabeau, 
305, 309, 317, 321, 322 ; Revolu- 
tions de France et de Brabant, 
309-12 

Despotism, Essay on, Mirabeau, 
54. 55. 59. 63. 65, 165 



341 



INDEX 



Despotism in France, Mirabeau's 
views, 269 

Dialogue, The, Mirabeau, 55 

Diderot, 16 ; style, 66 

Dijon, Mirabeau at, 59-60 

Dohm, collaboration with Mira- 
beau, 119-20, 124 

Domine salvum fac regein, anti- 
Mirabeau pamphlet, 216 

Douai, Merlin de, 262 

Douay, Mile., establishment of, 70, 
72 

Doullens, 60 

Doutes siir la liberie de VEscaut^ 
Mirabeau, 11 2-1 3 

Dreux-Brez^, Mirabeau's apo- 
strophe of, 331-32 

Droz, History of the Reign oj 
Louis XVI, 222 

Duchatelet, 258 

Dumont, Etienne, Souvenirs sur 
Mirabeau, 111-12, 143, 186, 191, 
320-21, 324, 327-28 ; and Mira- 
beau, 179, 194, 206, 333 ; col- 
laboration with Mirabeau, 203, 
324 

Dupont (aft. Due de Nemours), 
negotiations for release of Mira- 
beau, 82 ; interview with Mira- 
beau, 213 ; his Memoir on 
Municipalities used by Mira- 
beau, 115, 129-30 

Duport, arguments of, 289 ; presi- 
dent, 299 ; attack on Mirabeau, 
303-4 

Duquesnoy, M., 287 

Durance, floods of the, 31 

Duras, regiment of, at Besangon, 
II 

Duras, Mme. de, and Chateau- 
briand, 149 

Duroveray, Mirabeau and, 97, 179, 
186, 194, 321, 324 

Eaux, Compagnie des, -Mirabeau's 

pamphlet against, 114, 11 5-1 7 
Economics, the, 31 
Education, Mirabeau on, 79, 225 
Elisabeth, Madame, 35 
Elliott, Gilbert, iii 
Emigration, law relating to, 302-5 



Eniile, 15, 167 

Emmery, 287 

Encyclopedic, The, publications of 
Ouesnay, 16 

England, France and, Mirabeau's 
idea of a rapprochement between, 
I12-13, 121, 242, 256 ; Mira- 
beau's opinion of British policy, 
262-63. 

Ephemerides du citoyen, 31 

Escaut, navigation of the, 11 2-1 3 

Espremesnil, Monsieur d', 1 42, 245, 

335 
Esprit des Lois, 167 
Esterno, Count d', 118, 121, 123 
Eugene, Prince, 5 
Ewart, secretary, 119 

Fage, M. de La, 88; letters from 
Mirabeau, 112 

Fare, Marquis de La, proposition 
regarding Mirabeau, 156, 157 

Farmers-general, attack of Marquis 
de Mirabeau, 18 

Favras, M. de, 221, 241 

Fayette, M. La, and Calonne, 
133 ; the draft Declaration of 
Rights, 193, 195; and Mirabeau, 
205, 212, 214, 220-21, 239, 
252, 272, 297 ; and Necker, 
213; vote of thanks to, 214; 
place in the Council proposed 
for, 214, 215 ; the formation of 
a ministry, 216 ; and Monsieur, 
220-22 ; Memoirs of, 222 ; Mira- 
beau's letters to, 231, 237, 249- 
50 ; influence with Louis XVL 
231 ; policy, 236 ; Mirabeau's 
attempts at friendship, 248-50 ; 
Mirabeau's attacks on, 266-68, 
272 ; at Nancy, 269 ; and the 
flag, 274 ; and the new Ministry, 
279-80 ; and Duport, 303-4 

Federation festivities, 250, 254 

Ferdinand, Archduke of Austria, 

253 
Ferrieres, Marquis de, 202 ; on 

Mirabeau quoted, 309, 321 
Fersen, M., 315 
Finance, Mirabeau and the art of, 

1 1 3-1 5; Mirabeau on the finance 



342 



INDEX 



of the Kingdom, 224-25 ; the 
assignats, 264-67 
Flag, the national, the debate on, 

273-74 

Fontaine, La, Mirabeau and, 77 

Fontanges, M. de, Archbishop of 
Toulouse, and Mirabeau's debts, 
234, 237, 239, 293 

Foreign languages, views of Mira- 
beau regarding study of, 64 

Fos, Sibylle de, 23 

Fouche, 290 

Foulon, assassination of, 188 

Francois, baker, assassination of, 

215 

Frankfort-on-the-Main, 118 
Franklin, Mirabeau and, no, 170 
Frederick II, and Mirabeau, 118, 
120, 169, 170; death, 122; por- 
trait in the De la Monarchie 
Prussienne, 132 
Frederick William II, 122, 123 ; 

Mirabeau's letter to, 302 
Frederick William III, 123 
( Free Trade, Marquis de Mirabeau, 
\ and, 14 
\Freemasonry, Mirabeau and, 64-65, 

72 
Freron, Mirabeau and, 246 
Freteau, the diplomatic committee, 

258 
Frochot, quoted^ 307 
Fronde, the, 290 

Gallifet, Comte de, 106 

Gamaches, M., 335 

Gambetta, quoted, 308 

Garat, 203 

Gassaud, M. de, relations with 

Mirabeau, 42, 43, 45 
Gebelin, and Mirabeau, 35 
Geneva, 61, 322 
Genevese, the, introduction into 

French finance, 129 
Gerle, Dom, motion of, 337 
Glandeves, Marguerite de, 4 
Goethe, on Mirabeau, quoted, 320, 

325 
Grammont, Marquis de, 37 
Grasse, house of Madame de Cabris 

at, 43-44. 47 



Grimm and Diderot, Correspond- 
ence, 150, 170 
Guemadeuc, Baudouin de, 88 

Hardy, secretary, 113 

Haren, Willem van, 109 

Helvetius, 16 

Henry, Prince, of Prussia, 118, 
122, 123, 149 

Henry IV, 336 

Hertzberg, Minister, 123 

Hesse, Prince of, 65 

Histoire Secrete de la Cour de 
Berlin, 149-51. ^51^ 1 7^-73 

History of the reign of Louis XVI, 
Droz, 222 

Honore, M., name given to Mira- 
beau on leaving Vincennes, 88 

Hotel de Ville, Marie Antoinette's 
speech, 240-41 

Husbandry, Court of, established 
by Mirabeau, 34 

If, Chiteau d', imprisonment of 

Mirabeau in the, 48-51, 252 
Independence, War of, no 
India Company, shares of the, 127 
Insurgents, the, 94 

Jacobin Club, Mirabeau and the, 
256, 268, 271-72, 278-79, 333 ; 
scene on Dec. 6, 303-5 

Janin, Jules, 320 

Jaures, M., 318 

Jausserandy, M. de, 44 

Jesuits, Mirabeau and the, 65 

Jeu de Paume, oath of the, 14, 198 

Joseph II, Emperor, 112 

Joseph, P^re, 49, 290 

Joubert, counsel, 105 

Journal des titats Gendraux, Mira- 
beau, 176-77 

Joux, Chateau de imprisonment 
of Mirabeau, 51-52, 59-60, 252 

Judicature, Mirabeau on the, 79 

Kunsberg, Countess von, 7-8 

Lagrange, return to France, 124 
Lamballe, Princesse de, 88 
Lambert, Marquis de, 29-30 



343 



INDEX 



Lambesc, reception of Mirabeau, 
157-58 

Lameth, M. Alexandre de, on 
Mirabeau, 200 ; report of inter- 
view at Passy, 213; policy, 236; 
question raised by, 242-43 ; 
Montmorin and, 281 ; and Mira- 
beau's speech at the Jacobin 
Club, 303-5 ; the attack on 
Mirabeau, 318-19 ; Histoire de 
P Assetnblde Constitua7ite^ yZAi 

Lameth, M. Charles de, the duel, 
277; and D'Andre, 335 

Lamoignon, Keeper of the Seals, 
the coup (Tdtat of November 19, 
137 ; and the Parlements, 140; 
and Mirabeau, 145-46. 

Lamotte, Madame de, 277 

Lamourette, Abb^, 293, 325, 328 

"Lancefaudras (Marquis de)," 
name taken by Mirabeau at 
Dijon, 59-60 

Languedoc, States of, 14 

Lanjuinais, deputy, motion of, 219; 
on Mirabeau, 319 

Lauzun, Due de, and Mirabeau, 
117, 142, 157, 172, 174; letters 
from Mirabeau, 147-49, 151, 
162 ; and the R^ponse aux 
alarmes^ 170 

Lavater, 119 

Lavenue, income tax proposed by, 

323 

Law, the, Mirabeau on, 79-80 

Lawyers, the, Mirabeau's replv to, 
298 

Le lecteur y tnettra le Hire, Mira- 
beau, 66, 297 

Legrain, valet, 95 

Leipsic, 118 

Lejay, bookseller, Mirabeau and, 

143. 151 
Lejay, Madame, 143-44 
Lenoir, M., 330 
Lettres d Cerutti^ Mirabeau, 150, 

173 
Lettres de Cachet and State Prisons^ 

Mirabeau, 78-80, 119, 162, 167 
Lettres icrites au donjon de Vin- 

cenngs, Mirabeau, 72-73, 165, 

330 



Levis, Due de, 219, 220, 321 
Levrault, bookseller, Mirabeau's 

letter to, 144 
Liberty, Mirabeau's definition of, 

303 

Limousin, the, 20, 21, 34, 35 

Lomenie, M. de, 237 

London, Mirabeau's remarks on, 
80, III 

Longueville, M. de, 71 

Lorgues in Provence, 61 

Lorraine infantry legion of, Mira- 
beau attached to, 30, 31 

Louis XI, 79 

Louis XIV. 4, 5, 79, 253, 337 

Louis XVI, relations with Mira- 
beau, 121, 124, 127, 184, 190, 
191, 206, 233-36 ; coup-detat 
of Nov. 19, 137 ; Mirabeau's 
prophecy concerning, 138; Mira- 
beau's estimation of, 164-65 ; 
and the Keeper of the Seals, 
178-79 ; deputations from the 
National Assembly, 185, 187: 
proposal to remove the Assembly, 
187 : recall of the troops, 188 ; 
question of the royal prerogative, 
196-97 ; an incident, 203 ; and 
the Declaration of the Rights 
of Man, 208, 336 ; the King's 
person declared inviolable, 209 ; 
Mirabeau's plan for the removal 
of the Royal Family from Paris, 
210-12, 315-16 ; enforced return 
to the Tuileries, 210 ; and the 
Comte de Provenge, 220 ; the 
draft treaty, 222 ; and the Mar- 
seillaise, 229 ; visit to the 
National Assembly, 230 ; and 
Necker, 233 ; Hquidation of 
Mirabeau's debts, 234-38 ; 
Mirabeau's notes on the situa- 
tion, 234-35 ; character, 239-40, 
269-70, 282, 284-85, 315-16 ; 
interview with Mirabeau, 252-54; 
the Federation festivities, 254 ; 
Assembly asks for a new Minis- 
try, 293 ; suspicion of Mirabeau, 
292, 314-15; the proposed jour- 
ney of his aunts, 299-300 ; the 
deputation from Paris, 305. 



344 



INDEX 



Louis XVI n, 149 

Louvre, the, Mirabeau's reference 

to, 337-38 
Luxembourg, 221 

Machiavelli, 290 

Magistrates, Mirabeau on the, 79 

Malesherbes, M. de, 60, 67, 240, 

338 
Malouet, Mirabeau and, 179-80, 

183, 235, 277-78, 301, 304, 316 
Manifesto to the Provenqal Nation, 

Manosque, town of, 42, 43, 44, 48, 

113 

Manuel, Procureur de la Commune 
de Paris, Letters from the Keep 
of Vincennes, T^TZ 

Marat, threats of, 308 

Marck,Comte de La, and Mirabeau, 
115, 169, 183, 184, 191, 208, 
230, 274, 278, 290, 299, 307; 
and the attack on Versailles, 204, 
205 ; a portrait of Mirabeau, 
206-7 ; pls^n for the removal of 
the royal family, 210-12, 212, 
220 ; letters from Mirabeau, 214, 
221, 223, 259, 275, 276, 293, 
297; reproaches Mirabeau, 226; 
negotiations between Mirabeau 
and the Court, 233, 234, 237, 
238-39, 251, 252, 266, 281, 
315-16, 326; judgment on Mira- 
beau, 237 ; saying of, quoted, 
271 ; and Mercy-Argenteau, 277; 
and the ecclesiastical question, 
294-95 ; mission to Metz, 299 

Maria Theresa, Empress, 207 

Marignane, Marquis de, marriage 
of his daughter, 37, 39, 40-42 ; 
and the debts of Mirabeau, 42 ; 
letters on death of his grandson, 
81 ; Mirabeau's appeals to, 83, 
85-87 ; attitude towards Mira- 
beau, 94-95, 98-99, loi, 103 ; 
lawsuit at Pontarlier, 103, 104 

Marignane, Marquise de, 39 

Marmontel, Memoirs, 16 

Marriage de Figaro, 116 

Marseilles disturbances, 158-59, 
227, 228, 333; Mirabeau elected. 



160 ; provost of, denounced by 

Mirabeau, 216-17 
Marshals, Court of, 91 
Maurepas, Comte de, 80 ; letter to, 

330 

Maury, Abbe, 227 : policy, 295 ; 
and Mirabeau, 304, 333-4, 337 ; 
Mirabeau's remarks on, 335-36 

Mauvillon, Major, Mirabeau and, 
124, 139, 183; and the De la 
Monarchie Prussienne, 131-33 ; 
Mirabeau's correspondence with, 
143, 166, 168, 224, 225, 255, 
268, 269 

Memoir on the utility of the 
Provincial States, Marquis de 
Mirabeau, 13-14 

Memoirs du Ministere du Due 
d Aiguillon, Mirabeau, 164 

Menou, 258 

Mercure de France^ 74, 1 39 

Mercy-Argenteau, M. de, and 
Mirabeau, 220, 233, 234, 252 ; 
principles, 237 ; letters from 
Marie Antoinette, 239, 275, 315 ; 
and La Marck, 277; and the 
reform of the Constitution, 289- 
90 

Merey, Soufflot de, Mirabeau's 
letters to, 134, 136 

Metz, 211, 299; Parlement of, 226 ; 
mutiny at, 254 

Meunier, M. Dauphin, 88 

Michelet, on Mirabeau, 180, 197, 
206, 238, 301 

Military spirit, Mirabeau on the, 79 

Mines, Mirabeau's dissertation on, 
306, 326 

Ministers, the, Mirabeau's i-emarks 
on, 116, 217-18; proposed dis- 
missal, 188 ; proposal to substi- 
tute the national colours for the 
white ensign, 273 ; Mirabeau's 
advice to the King regarding, 
274 ; the Jacobins and the, 
279; drawn from members of 
the Assembly, 286 

Mirabeau, Alexandre-Louis Riqueti 
de, 7-8 

Mirabeau, Andrd-Boniface-Louis 
Riqueti de, 20 



345 



INDEX 



Mirabeau, Bruno Riqueti de, 22 
Mirabeau, Chateau de, 4, 6, 30, 

41-42 
Mirabeau, Comte de, childhood 
and education, 27 ; income, 39- 
42 ; and Sophie de Monnier, 
54-61 ; characteristics, 57-58, 
67, 74-75, 77-78, 91-92, loi, 
111-12, 119-20, 149, 169-70; 
escape from the Chateau de 
Joux, 59-60 ; flight to Hol- 
land, 63-70 ; at Vincennes, 
71-88 ; address to the King 
quoted^ 74-75 ; poetry composed 
at Vincennes, 77 ; opinion on 
the judicature, 79 ; opinion on 
religion, 79, 165-67, 195-96; 
death of his son, 81 ; the law- 
suits at Pontarlier, 95-107; visit 
to Neuchatel, 97-98 ; the 
Comtesse obtains a separation, 
99-106; the speech at PontarHer, 
102-6 ; visit to London, 1 10-13 ; 
in Berlin, 11 8-1 9, 121 ; report 
on the European situation, 121 ; 
the campaign in Provence, 152- 
60 ; as a royalist, 161-65, 206 ; 
extent of his knowledge, 168- 
69 ; the charge of venality, 170- 
71, 316-17 ; at the States- 
General, 176-205 ; pohcy, 182- 
84 ; messages to Louis XVI, 
185, 186-7 ; speeches in the 
Assembly, 185-91 ; and the dis- 
missal of ministers, 188 ; the 
declaration of the Rights of 
Man, 193-95 ; on the Royal 
prerogative, 196-97 ; speeches 
on finance, 197-203, 217-18, 
224-25, 264-67 ; the attack on 
Versailles, 204-5 ; prophecies 
of, 206-7 '■> portrait by M. de La 
Marck, 207 ; protest against the 
invasion of the Assembly, 209 ; 
plan for the removal of the royal 
family, 210-12 ; attack on the 
ministry, 214, 218; two draft 
ministries, 214-15 ; and the 
Provost of Marseilles, 216-17 ; 
the cabal against him, 218-20 ; 
and the Comte de Provence, 



220-22 ; relations with the 
Court, 222-91 ; his debts liquid- 
ated, 234-38 ; speech on the 
King's right to make war and 
peace, 242-46 ; and La Fayette, 
249-50 ; views on the army, 
254 ; on France's relation with 
Spain, 256-57, 258-64 ; the 
diplomatic committee formed, 
258-59 ; foreign policy, 261-64; 
question of the assignats, 264- 
67 ; and the Jacobins, 268, 271- 
72 ; views on the bases of the 
Constitution, 270-71, 283 ; and 
the flag, 274 ; and Marie- 
Antoinette, 277-78 ; the 47th 
note to the Court, 281-83 ; on 
the reform of the Constitution, 
285-91 ; speeches on the ecclesi- 
astical question, 293-96; and 
the National Guard, 297 ; presi- 
dent of the National Assembly, 
297-99 ; " Silence, you thirty ! " 
302 ; on the law relating to 
emigration, 302-5 ; illness and 
death, 305-8 ; the speech on 
inheritance, 307, 333 

Letters to — 
Dauvers, Mile. Julie, 88 
Fage, La, 112 
Fayette, M. de La, 231, 237, 

249-50 
Frederick William of Prussia, 

302 
Lauzun, Due de, 147-49, 162 
Levrault the bookseller, 144 
Louis XVI, 164-65, 234-35, 242 
Marck, M. de La, 214, 221, 223, 

259, 275-76, 293, 297 
Marignane, M. de, 85-86 
Mauvillon, 168, 224, 225, 255, 

268, 269 
Mirabeau, Comtesse de, 46-47, 

49-52, 83-4, 87, 90, 93-4 
Mirabeau, Marquis de, 27-8 
Mirabeau, the " Bailli," 56, 

313 
Monnier, Sophie de, 71-74, 78, 

80, 330 
Montmorin, 137-40, 142-43, 

164, 172-73,174-5 



346 



INDEX 



Nehra, Mnie. de, 120, 128, 130, 

131, 143-44 
Saillant, Mme. du, 43, 223, 226 
Talleyrand, 215 
Mirabeau, Works of- — 
Addresse aux Bataves, 166, 193, 

194 
Analyse des -papier s anglais, 

139 

Anecdote, the, 68-69 

Answer to the author of the 

Administrators of the Cam- 

pagnie des Eaux of Paris, 

114 
Avis aupeuple Marsetllais, 159 
Avis aux Hessois, 65 
Bank of Spain, known as the 

Bank of St. Charles, 114 
Caisse d'Escompte, 114, 126 
Cojtsiderations on the order of 

Cincinnatus, 111-12 
Correspondance Secrete, 149 
De la Monarchie Prussienne, 

129-33, 165-66, 171 
Denonciatian de F Agiotage, 1 26- 

29, 142, 165 
Dialogue, The, 55 
Doutes sur la liberie de PEscaut, 

112-13 
Essay on Moses Mendelssohn and 

the political reform of the Jews, 

123-24 
Essai sur la despotisme, 54-55, 

59, 63, 65, 165 
Histoire Secrete de la Cour de 

Berlin, 149-51, 157, 170-73 
Journal des Etats Geitdraux, 

176-77 
Lecteur y Alettra le litre, Le, 66, 

297 
Letter to M. le Conteulx de la 

Noraye on the Bank of Spain 

and on the Caisse d' Escompte, 

114 
Letters a Cerutti, 150, 173 
Letters de Cachet and State 

Prisons, 78-80, 119, 162, 167 
Letters du Cotnie de Mirabeau a 

ses commettants, ijy 
Letters dcrites du donjon de Vin- 

cennes, 165, 330 



Manifesto to the Provencal 

Nation, 156 
Memoir, the, 75-77, 109 
Memoires du Ministere du Due 

d'Aiguillon, 164 
On the Shares of the Compagnie 

des Eaux of Paris, 114 
Reponse aux alai-mes des bons 

citoyens, 141-42, 165, 170 
Salt Marshes of Fratiche Comte, 
The, 54 

Mirabeau, Comtesse de, marriage 
with Mirabeau, 36-41 ; and M. 
Gassaud, 42-43 ; letters from her 
father-in-law, 45, 92-93 ; letters 
from Mirabeau, 46-47, 49-50, 
51-52, 83-84, 87, 93-94, 223; 
and the Comte's imprisonment 
at the Chateau d'lf, 48 ; refuses 
to join Mirabeau, 56 ; and her 
son, 67-68 ; death of her son, 
81-82 ; and Mme. du Saillant, 
89 ; reply to the Bailli, 94 ; and 
the negotiations for reconciliation, 
98-99 ; obtains a separation from 
Mirabeau, 99-106 

Mirabeau, Honore II Riqueti de, 
22 

Mirabeau, Honore III Riqueti de, 
4, 22 

Mirabeau, Honore- Gabriel Riqueti 
de, 20 

Mirabeau, Jean-Antoine Riqueti 
de, 4-7, 22, 23 

Mirabeau, Marquis de, account of, 
3, 10-13 ; and Ouesnay's princi- 
ples, 16-18 ; arrest and release, 
18 ; education of his son, 28, 29, 
31-32 ; estimate of his son's 
character, 28, 30, 31, 91-92, 
loi, 161, 296, 329 ; relation 
with the Marquise, 33-34 ; letter 
to Mile, de Marignane, 37-38 ; 
absence from marriage of his 
son, 39 ; the marriage settle- 
ments, 40-42 ; letters to Com- 
tesse de Mirabeau, 45,81-82,92- 
93 ; imprisonment of his son in 
the Chateau d'lf, 48 ; in the 
Chateau de Joux, 51, 52, 56 ; 
attempt to confine him at Dijon, 



347 



INDEX 



60 ; arrest of his son in Holland, 
67-69 ; attitude towards his son 
atVincennes, 80-88; letters to the 
Bailli, 90,147; attempts at recon- 
ciliation, 90, 92,98-99 ; the law- 
suits at Pontarlier, 95, 96, 101-6; 
his letters read at Pontarlier, 1 01- 
7 ; sued by his son, 1 08 ; on his son 
in England, quoted, 114-15 ; and 
the dedication of the De la 
Monarchie Prussienne, 131, 146; 
OQ his son's candidature for the 
States- General, 145-46 ; recep- 
tion of his son at Argenteuil, 
146-47 ; on his son's irreligion, 
165-66 ; the chai'ge against his 
son of venality, 170, 171 ; 
death, 191 ; sayings of, quoted, 

253 

Works of — 
L^Aini des Homines, 14-18^ 
Mirabeau's abstract from, 167- 

68 
Memoir on the utility of the Pro- 
vincial states, 13-14 
Political Testament, 13 
Theory of Taxation, 1 7-1 8 
Voyage de Languedoc et de Pro- 
vence, II 
Mirabeau, Marquise de, relations 
with the Marquis, 18-20 ; chil- 
dren of, 20-21 ; death of her 
mother, 33-34 ; absence from 
marriage of Mirabeau, 39 ; 
Mirabeau and, 87 ; the decree 
of separation, Mirabeau's 
attempts at reconciliation, 89 ; 
loan contracted by, 108 
Mirabeau, the "Bailli" Riqueti de, 
account of, 8-10, 13, 22 ; visit 
of Mirabeau to, 30-32 ; opinions 
regarding Mirabeau, 33-34, 329; 
and marriage of Mirabeau, 36, 
39 ; at Le Bignon, 46 ; letters 
from the Comte de Mirabeau, 
56, 145-46, 313, 330; letters 
from the Marquis de Mirabeau, 
6g, 147 ; the Lettres de Cachet 
attributed to, 78 ; sayings of, 
quoted, 82, 86 ; negotiations for 
the release of Mirabeau, 87; and 



the Comtesse de Mirabeau, 94 ; 
and the negotiations for a recon- 
ciliation, 98, 99 ; the lawsuits at 
Pontarlier, 101-2, 106 ; Mira- 
beau's ingratitude to, 106 

Mirabeau, Thomas Riqueti de, 
grandson of Jean, 4 

Mirabeau, Thomas Riqueti de, son 
of Honore II, 21-22 

Mirabelles, the, 115 

Miromesnil, M. de, and Mirabeau, 
107, no 

Monarchie Prussienne, De la, 
Mirabeau, 29-33, 146, 165-66, 
171 

Moniteur, the, 323 

Monnier, Marquis de, and his 
wife, 53, 59 ; action against 
Mirabeau, 69 ; Mirabeau's debt 
to, 94 

Monnier, Marquise de (Sophie), 
and Mirabeau, 53-59, 60-61, 
no ; arrest in Holland, 69-70 ; 
correspondence with Mirabeau, 
71-74, 78, 80, 330 ; self-abnega- 
tion of, 83 ; death of the child, 
87 ; at Gien, 90-91 ; result of 
the lawsuit at Pontarlier, 96 ; 
death of, 97 

Montargis, Convent of, 20-21 

Montesquieu, Abbe de, 287 

Montesquiou, President de, 14, 
167 

Montherot, M. de, 59 

Montigny, Lucas de, child of, 113; 
Memoirs, 116, 236 

Montlosier, M. de, 336 

Montmorin, M. de. Foreign Minis- 
ter, 130, 214, 242, 257, 272, 
279-81, 290 ; Mirabeau's letters 
to, 134-35. 137-39, 140, 142-43, 
164, 172-75, 182-83 ; and the 
Ajialyse, 139-40 ; and the 
Parlements, 140 ; and the Mar- 
quis de Mirabeau, 145-147; 
financial transactions with Mira- 
beau, 147-49, 151 ; reply to 
Mirabeau, 173-74 ; deserts La 
Fayette, 281 ; and the ministers, 
287, 289 

Montperreux, M. de, 54, 55 



348 



INDEX 



Moret, 300 

Mouans, M. de, 63 

Mounier, motion of, 188, 189; 
draft Declaration of Rights, 193, 
195 ; and Mirabeau, 204-5, 269 

Murray, Sir James, 119 

Music and Poetry, Mirabeau on. 
66-67 

Nancy, military insurrection in, 
268, 269 

National debt, the, Mirabeau's 
speech, 198-203 ; Necker's pro- 
posals, 199-201 

National Guard, the, in Mar- 
seilles, 228-29 ; and the Assem- 
bly, 285 ; Mirabeau chief of a 
battalion, 297 

Navarre, Mile., 7 



Oath of the Jeu de Pattme, 14, 
198 ; oath of fidelity, Mirabeau 
on, 300, 301 ; the ecclesiastical 
oath, 292, 293-95 

Orleans, Due d', 35, 137, 203-5, 
212-13 

Pailly, Mme. de, and the Marquis 

de Mirabeau, 18-19 ; and the 

Comte de Mirabeau, 33, 35, 87 ; 

at Le Bignon, 46 ; and M. de 

Marignane, 81 
Palais Royal, attack on the, 142, 

202 
Pan, Mallet du, 139-40, 204 
Panchaud, banker, 113, 114, 120, 

129, 157, 171, 266 
Pantheon, remains of Mirabeau 

removed from the, 308 



Necker, M., Mirabeau and, 128- Paris, Mirabeau on, 80 ; under 



29, 148, 150, 168, 173, 177, 
221, 224, 231, 233, 266, 268 ; 
meeting with Mirabeau, 179-80, 
183 ; dismissal, 187, 188, 212, 
213, 217; and the veto, 197; 
measures of, 199-201 ; premier- 
ship for, proposed, 214, 215 ; 
Marie Antoinette and, 240 ; and 
the ministers, 279, 280 
Nehra, Mme. de, and Mirabeau, 
109-13 ; in Berlin, 118, 120 ; 
correspondence with Mirabeau, 
120, 128, 130, 131, 143-44 ; 
the break with Mirabeau, 143- 
44 ; observation of, quoted, 

151 

Nemours, Due de, 157. See 
Dupont 

Neuchatel, Council of, 95 ; Mira- 
beau's visit to, 97-98 

Nivernais, Due de, 29 

Noailles, Due de, 35 ; Mirabeau 
and, 80 

Nobility, States of the, Mirabeau 
and, 152-55, 158 

Noir, M. Le, Lieutenant-general 
of Police, 70-72, 80 



Mirabeau's proposed constitu- 
tion, 287-88 ; popularity of 
Mirabeau in, 296-98 ; deputa- 
tion to the National Assembly, 
305; Paris, Parlement of 1787, 
dismissed to Troyes and recalled, 
the question of the loan, 33-36 ; 
coup de'tat of Nov. 19, 137 ; 
motion Dec. 5, 1788, 164. 

Parlements, the, Mirabeau's 
pamphlet against, 140-42, 163, 
226 

Passy, 213 

Peace, war and, the king's right 
to make, 244-50 ; Mirabeau's 
views on universal peace, 255- 
56, 261 ; the diplomatic com- 
mittee, 258 

Pellenc, secretary, 306, 307, 325, 
326, 328 

Pelletier, Le, the pamphlet Domine 
salvuin, 216 

Peltier, and the Letti'-es de Cachet, 
78 

Perigord, Abbe de. See Talley- 
rand 

Peronne, cure of, 294 



Nootka, bay of, 256 ; ceded to Petion, and the banquet of the 

England, 260 bodyguard, 208-9 

Nouvelle Heloise, the, 74, 167 Petites Orphelines, Convent of the 

Noyon, 187 109 

349 



INDEX 



Peyssonnel, 325 

Physiocrats, the, Mirabeau and, 
167, 168 

Pierre-Buffiere, barony of, 12 ; the 
name applied to Mirabeau, 29, 
30, 32, 329 

Pin, M. La Tour du, 272 

Pitt, policy of, 260-61, 313 

Plan, M. Ph., Un collaborateur de 
Mirabeau, 321 

Poetry, music and, Mirabeau on, 
66-67 

Poisson, tutor, 27-28 

Poix, Prince de, 207 

Political Testafnent, Marquis de 
Mirabeau, 13 

Pompadour, Mme. de, 9, 16 

Pompignan, Le France de, 11, 35 

Pontarlier, 51, 52, 56, 58, 59 ; the 
lawsuits at, 95-107, 331 

Pont^ves, Anne de, 4, 23 

Pont^ves, Seigneur de, 4 

Pont-Saint-Esprit, 31 

Pope, the, and the civil constitution 
of the clergy, 292-93 

Portalis, advocate, 100, 102, 104, 
105 

Portalis, the younger, 153 

Pradt, Abbe de. Bishop of Perpig- 
nan, 293 

Precis des e'lemens, 31 

Press, liberty of the, Mirabeau and, 
177 

Price, Dr., iii 

Privileges, Mirabeau's theories re- 
garding, 163 

Property, ecclesiastical, placed at 
the disposal of the nation, 216 

Proudhon, on Mirabeau, 237 238, 
318 

Provence, Tiers fetat of, and Mira- 
beau, 152-55, 158 

Provence, Mirabeau and the 
peasantry, 36 ; Mirabeau's cam- 
paign, 145, 150 ; the elections 
in, 152-60 ; Communes of, 154 ; 
noblesse of, and Mirabeau, 336 

Provence, Comte de, and Mira- 
beau's plan, 205, 212, 220-22, 
241, 316 ; Lieut.-General of the 
kingdom, 220 ; speech before 



the Commune, 221-22 ; the 
draft treaty with the Court, 222 ; 
question of the King leaving 
Paris, 233 ; on the King's char- 
acter, 239 
Prussia, Mirabeau's book on De la 
Monarchie Prussienne, 129-33, 
146, 165-66, 171 

Quakers, deputation to Mirabeau, 
298 

Quesnay, Dr., principles, 14, 15, 
16-18, 194 

Quinet, Edgar, criticism of, 292 

Quinze- Vingts, deputation to Mira- 
beau, 298 

Rabaut-Saint-Etienne, Mirabeau 
and, 178 ; principles, 197 

Racine, Mirabeau and, 77 

Rahel, Mme., description of Mira- 
beau, 119 

Re, island of, 30 

Regency, debate on the, 306, 326, 
336 

Religion, Mirabeau on, 79, 195-96 

Rennes, Parlement of, and the 
Assembly, 226 

Rentiers, 14 

Reponse aux alarmes des bons 
ci toy ens, 141-42, 165, 170 

Retz, Cardinal de, 71, 290 

Revolution, the : the Bastille 
stormed, 187 ; the July riots, 
188-90 ; decrees of Aug. 4, 191 ; 
Declaration of the Rights of 
Man, 192-95. 255, 313 ; in- 
vasion of Versailles, 203-5 

Rey, bookseller, 63 

Reybaz, the Genevese, 264, 327, 
328 ; method of work, 325 ; and 
Mirabeau, collaboration of Mira- 
beau, 321-24 

Richelieu, 79, 290, 308, 313 

Richmond, Duke of, 11 1 

Riolles, M. de, arrest, 267-68 

Riqueti family the, 4, 20 ; charac- 
teristics, 21-23 

Riqueti, Jean, consul of Marseilles, 

4 
Riqueti, Pierre, 3-4 



350 



INDEX 



Riqueti. See Mirabeau 

Rivarol, 334 

Robespierre, 228, 278, 289, 303, 

306, 309 
Rochefort, Mme. de, 18 
Rochefoucauld, Due de la, 307, 

337 
Rochelle, 30 

Rochemore, Elisabeth de, 23 
Roederer, 338 
Rohan, Cardinal de, 120 
Roland, Mme., 321 
Romilly, Samuel, iii 
Rouen, 211 ; Parlement of, 226 
Rougemont, M. de, 72 
Rousseau, principles, 54, 55, 66, 

67. 74. n> 167, 194, 313 

Royal prerogative, Mirabeau and 

the, 196-97 
Ruffey family, the, and Mirabeau, 

60, 68-69, 95 
Ruffey, Mme. de, 87, 95 

Saillant, Marquis du, 20, 30, 35, 
46, 89, 96 

Saillant, Marquise du, and Mira- 
beau, 33, 73 ; letter from M. de 
Mirabeau, 43 ; at Le Bignon, 
46 ; and M. de Marignane, 81 ; 
letter to the Comtesse de Mira- 
beau, 89 ; correspondence with 
Mirabeau, 223, 226; death of 
Mirabeau, 307 

Saint-Bartholomew, massacre of, 

337 

Saint-Beuve quoted, 238, 330 

Saint-Cannat, reception of Mira- 
beau in, 157-58 

Saint-Charles, Bank of, Mirabeau's 
pamphlet against, 11 4-1 5 

Saint-Claire, Convent of, at Gien, 

72 
Saint-Cloud, the interview at, 252- 

54 
Saint-Eustache, Church of, 308 
Saint-Genevi^ve, Church of, 307 
Saint- Mauris, M. de, governor of 

the Chateau de Joux, 51-59, 95 
Saint-Pelagie, 70 
Saint-Pierre, Abbe de, 256 
Saint-Priest, Comte de, 215, 272 



Saint-Simon, Mirabeau compared 
with, 121-22, 132 

Salpetri^re, 60 

Salt Marshes of Franche-Comte, 
Mirabeau, 54 

Sauveboeuf, Marquis de, 12 

Saxe, Marshal, 7 

Segur, Comte Louis de, 258 

Segur, M. de, Declme of the Mon- 
archy, 240 

Semonville, M. de, 213, 288 

Sdnechaussee, Lieut, de la, loi 

Seven Years' War, 9 

Sevigne, Mme. de, cited, 23 

Shelburne, Lord, iii 

Sifeyes, Mirabeau and, 177, 180, 
.215, 327 

Sigrais, 28 

Soissons, 187 

Sombarde, 95 

Sorel, M. Albert, quoted, 122, 220, 
290 

Soulavie, Abbe, 164 

Sovereign, the, Mirabeau's opinions 
on the position of the king, 162, 
164, 224, 242-44, 250-51 ; Mira- 
beau on the royal prerogative, 
196-97 ; the King's right to 
make war and peace, 242-50 

Spain, Mirabeau and the affairs of, 
258-64 ; the Family Compact, 
256-57, 314 ; the diplomatic 
committee, 258-59 ; Spain's re- 
lations with England, 260-61 

Speculation, Mirabeau on, 126-27 

Stael, Mme. de, judgment of Mira- 
beau, 176, 200, 203, 239, 309, 
321, 325 

States-General, convocation de- 
manded, 133-39, 235-36 ; called 
on Aug. 12, 1788, 139-42 ; the 
title of National Assembly given 
by Mirabeau, 140, 180-82 ; 
Mirabeau elected, 144, 147-48, 
160 ; Mirabeau at the, 176-205 ; 
the royal sitting of June 23, 185 ; 
meetings, 265, 316 

Suffrage, Mirabeau's theories on, 
162-63 

Sweden, King of, 315 

Swiss guard, the, 254 



351 



INDEX 



Tacitus, 54 ; saying of, quoted^ 

154 
Talleyrand, Mirabeau and, 117, 

120-21, 124, 128, 130, 149-50, 

157, 171, 172, 215, 264, 307, 

322, 333 
Talon, M., 213, 288, 289 
Taxation, Marquis de Mirabeau on, 

17-18 ; Comte de Mirabeau on, 

224-25 
Terror, the, 301 
Thymines, M. de, 145-46 
Theory of Taxation^ Marquis de 

Mirabeau, 17-18 
Thonon, 61 

Tithes, suppression of, 191-92, 292 
Tolendal, Lally, 188 
Tongres, 128 
Toul, 118 
Toulon, 30 
Toulouse, Archbishop of. See 

Brienne. Lomdnie de 
Toulouse, Parlement of, 226 
Tour Baulieu, Mile, de la, 61 
Tourettes, Marquis de, 43 
Tourves, 41 
Trenck, Baron, 122 
Trianon, 253 
Tricolour, the, 203 
Tuileries, the, enforced return of 

the king to, 210 ; Mirabeau's 

letters found in, 308 
Turgot, 16, 82 ; ministry of, 71, 

129, 133, 164 ; posthumous 

works, 129 ; reforms, 141, 168, 

215-16 ; article on Fondatio7is , 

216 ; Marie Antoinette and, 240 

Valbelle, Comte de, 41 
Valette, M. de la, 37 
Valfond, M., 335 
Valhadon, M. de, 53 
Valhadon, Mme. de, 95 
Varennes, 316 



Vassan, M. de, 12 

Vassan, Mme.de, 19-20, 33 

Vassan, Mile de. See Mirabeau, 
Marquise de 

Vauban, Marechal de, quoted, 22 

Vauguyon, Due de, 69 

Vauvenargues, General, 7, 11, 12 

Venaissin, county of, 262 

Vendome, Due de, 5 

Verdache, Seigneur de, 44 

Verdun, 118 

Vergennes, M. de, 69, 118, 121 ; 
Mirabeau's memoir to, on 
Geneva, 97-98 

Verri^res, Mirabeau's flight to, 60- 
63 

Versailles, invasion of, 203-5 

Victoire, Mme., journey to Rome, 
299-301 

Villeneuve, M. de, 44 

Vincennes, Chateau of, imprison- 
ment of the Marquis de Mirabeau, 
18 ; of the Comte de Mirabeau, 
71-88, 175, 189, 252, 329-30 

Viomesnil, Colonel de, 30 

Virieux, M., 335 

Vitry, 108 

Voidel, report of, 293-94 

Volney, M. de, 334 ; motion for 
dissolution of the Assembly, 198 

Voltaire, 321 ; principles, 167 

Voss, Fraulein von, 123 

Voyage de Langiiedoc et de Pro- 
vence^ II 

Vrilli^re, Due de la, 42 

Washington, saying of, quoted, 232 
White cockade, the, 203 

Xavierde Saxe, Vx'vcvze.^ quoted, 241 

Young, Arthur, 326 

Zaire, poetry of, 54 



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